Lviv in western Ukraine has still escaped Russian hostilities, but the city is preparing for them. Citizens collect and send aid to soldiers, areas in the midst of fighting, and civilians fleeing war.
LVIV Lviv in western Ukraine has so far escaped Russian warfare, but the war is already visible in the city in many ways.
Large numbers of refugees arrive during the war, military patrols take to the streets, the sale of alcohol is banned, the curfew starts at ten o’clock and from time to time the sound of air alarm sirens echoes in the air.
In the center of Lviv, volunteers wrap historically significant statues in protective materials. The precious stained glass windows of the church windows are protected with plywood.
– Because Lviv is actually a museum with a large number of historical monuments, we started work on the most vulnerable, churches. We have many different churches belonging to different denominations, Inna Dmytruk-Sorohtei says.
He is the director of restoration research at the National Art Gallery in Lviv
Dmytruk-Sorohtei regrets that no dome can be placed over the entire city.
The city’s historic center is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Founded in the Middle Ages, Lviv has historically been under many powers and names: during the Habsburg rule it was Lemberg, in the Polish period Lwów.
In the midst of hostilities, in addition to the people, the cultural and historical heritage is also in danger.
The statues in Lviv are protected by volunteers. People don’t just want to sit at home, not even Inna Dmytruk-Sorohtei.
– Now the museum is closed and I’m not needed there, so I work here.
Protected works of art and covered church windows are reminiscent of photographs of cities preparing for bombing from World War II.
– This is very sad. There are no words, Dmytruk-Sorohtey sighs.
The art museum became a relief center
The museums are closed, but there is a feverish buzz in the premises of the Lviv Palace of Arts: a 9,000-square-meter building is now sorting and distributing humanitarian aid. Volunteers work here too.
Tatjana Kostorna has made circular days as the coordinator of the center since the second day of the war.
– My kids are starting to forget what I look like. I can work here because my sister escaped from Kiev and is sitting with my children, she says.
Kostorna says the children are already sending her photos and asking in messages if the mother could come home.
– There’s a lot of work. But I understand that this is how I can do something for those in Kiev and Kharkov. I can’t stay home at a time like this.
People should even be prevented from coming to help because there would be too many newcomers.
– We will definitely win. Everyone is ready to fight, says Tatjana Kostorna.
– This is my country, our country. We won’t let them take it from us, ever again.
Director of the Military and Civil Administration of the Lviv Region, who visited the Humanitarian Center on Saturday Maksim Kozytskyi says the Lviv region is still peaceful.
– Our main task is to provide our fighters with everything they need on the front and to receive and support their wives and children in every way possible, Kozytskyi says.
He says that Vladimir Putin and the Russians made a mistake: they never believed that the Ukrainians would fight so hard.
– Because we are fighting for our own country, we know who the enemy is, and we will certainly win, Kozytskyi says.
Kozytskyi says Ukraine is grateful for Western help, although it could have come earlier.
– Time is always important. If we had guns a year or a half earlier, we would have been much more prepared to face the enemy.
Ukraine’s two armies: the people and men in uniforms
There is also a volunteer team that procures and sends drugs to war zones.
Israel-based producer Zhenja Danilenko arrived in Ukraine on the first day of the war. He came to help his family but could not get to his hometown of Kiev.
He and his friends started raising money on Facebook to buy drugs for Ukrainian hospitals.
– We found a brave driver who transported the first busiest delivery of medicines to Kiev, Danilenko says.
It would normally take 5-6 hours to travel from Lviv to Kiev, but this time it took the driver two days.
Driving during a night curfew is prohibited, and during the day the roads are full of checkpoints. The route is dangerous because Russian forces could face it.
However, the first drug trip was successful and the project began to expand.
– We understood that the system works and we can continue in the same spirit, Ženja Danilenko says.
The group has several drivers who are ready to take the cargo of medicines to the hottest places in the war in Ukraine. Medicines are delivered from Germany via Poland to Lviv and from there to the rest of Ukraine.
In times of war, there is a shortage of all kinds of medicines and supplies: aspirin, painkillers, bandages, anesthetics, and antibiotics.
Now, three truckloads of drugs leave for various cities in Ukraine in one day.
Zhenja Danilenko says it was Putin’s mistake that he imagined he was only fighting the army. The whole people of Ukraine are facing us.
– No one is indifferent. We are fighting not only because of our soldiers but because of the whole people. All of us are soldiers, who on any front: in volunteering, in the information war, Ženja Danilenko says.
– We have two armies: the People’s Army and the people in uniform.
You will be able to discuss the subject tomorrow evening, 9 March 2022, until 11 pm