A boy was born in the Ukrainian city of Novovolynsk in the early hours of yesterday morning. Why does this require even a moment of your attention? Because of the terrible circumstances in which the child, who has not yet been named, appeared in this world.
Just days before his birth, the war forced his father and his severely pregnant mother to flee Ukrainethe capital of Kyiv.
They had reached a few miles from the Polish border when nature — no doubt hastened by the stress of their refugee status — overtook them. She began to give birth.
And so their son was born – but not in the regular maternity ward of a nearby hospital, but in a makeshift theater in the basement of the bomb shelter, a space now shared with all other vulnerable patients.
To mark his arrival, the hospital posted this provocative message on its Facebook page yesterday: “Meet our newborn defender, 3.5 kg, 55 cm. On the fifth day of the war between Russia and Ukraine, a baby appeared at the hospital in Novovolynsk for a couple of immigrants from Kyiv.
Katerina Sukharokova keeps her newborn son Although in the basement of a maternity hospital, turned into a medical ward and used as a bomb shelter in Mariupol, Ukraine
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As this number of misery increases in the coming days and months, these innocent victims of the tyrant will need accommodation, schools and medical care.
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“Alarm sirens are heard all over Ukraine, in Volyn [the district in which the hospital is located] also. But life does not end even during the shelling. We wish the baby a peaceful sky. ‘
Thanks to Vladimir Putin, there is no peaceful sky in Ukraine today. And the country’s children – those who were not among more than 600,000 refugees who have crossed national borders to date – now live a confusing and largely underground existence in basements and subway platforms as air raid sirens sound.
The intensely moving and disturbing photos on these pages show just that.
In the besieged Black Sea port of Mariupol, Katerina Suharokova kisses her newborn son Makar in the basement of the maternity hospital, turned into a medical ward and used as a bomb shelter. What will happen to the two?
The more heartbreaking image, perhaps, is from an orphanage in the town of Kropyvnytskyi.
Many of the children there are sick. The tragic life has worsened. And this is happening all over the country.
In the besieged southern city of Kherson – surrounded by Russian forces invading Crimea – two boys were born in the maternity ward, which has also been moved to the hospital’s basement.
In the eastern city of Dnipro, ten babies have been born in a hospital since the beginning of the invasion.
Are these babies just the first of what can be a whole generation of Ukrainians, born either under direct threat of war or as refugees from their homeland?
Imagine the fear that made parents in Novovolinsk, especially the mother, go on the road without a purpose.
Knowing that hundreds of thousands of others are also fleeing and the route is congested with traffic, the hotels are full, a Russian attack is likely around the next turn.
Novovolynsk is located north of Lviv, 45 miles from Kyiv and only ten miles from the Polish border.
It is a former Soviet mining center with 50,000 people. It is twinned with the British industrial city of Hartlepool.
In addition, it is only 50 miles from the border with Belarus, whose military was announced yesterday to have joined the invasion.
The National Guard of Ukraine said: “This is a shelter in a specialized orphanage in the city of Kropyvnytskyi in Ukraine. All the children there are orphans. They are very sick … ‘
Dr Oleg Shipelik, a senior doctor at the Novovolinsk hospital, told the Mail that staff were responding best to the situation. They would not be afraid.
“We are currently organizing a 24-hour crèche in the basement of the hospital,” he said.
“This is for the children of our staff, so that their parents can work here around the clock without worrying too much about what is happening at home.”
But where will these babies be allowed – be safe – to grow up? In their home country Ukraine? Will there even be an independent Ukraine at the end of this barbaric war? Either it will be Poland or one of the many countries that are now opening their doors to emigration. Why not Hartlepool?
Photo published by Novovolynsk Hospital in Novovolynsk, a city in northwestern Ukraine near the Polish border, with the message “Children of War”
They are born in a world upside down.
Yesterday afternoon, in a side street of the beautiful old city of Lviv – a UNESCO World Heritage Site – I came across a queue of civilian men in front of a firearms store. They want to be armed if – or when – the Russian columns come.
Behind the corner of Ruska Street, stained glass windows of the Revival Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary are glued to protect them from explosions.
As I write, the sad howl of the warning siren begins again.
The tireless receptionist at our small hotel slams doors and shouts, “Come on! Quick! Enter the basement!
Thus began life for a growing number of new Ukrainians in these catastrophic times.