Photo by Igor Mityansky | Bucha. May 13, 2022 | Photographer Igor Mityansky remained in Bucha, a suburb of Kyiv, throughout the days of the Russian occupation.
Russia unleashed the biggest war in Europe since World War II with the justification that a modern, Western-leaning Ukraine was a constant threat and that Russia could not feel “safe, develop and exist.” Thousands of people have died, towns and cities such as Mariupol lie in ruins, and 13 million people have been displaced. But the questions remain: what was it all for, and how will it end? War criminal Vladimir Putin has spoken of Russia’s invasion as a “noble” cause. However, an opinion piece by the Russian state-run news agency Ria Novosti made it clear that “the Russian military operation is inevitably also de-Ukrainization”—in effect, erasing the modern state.