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When emergency workers arrived at the home of Tetyana Kulyk and her husband Pavlo Ivanchov shortly after it was hit by a Russian drone on Wednesday, all they could do was recover their charred bodies.
Kulyk, a renowned Ukrainian journalist, and Ivanchov, a surgeon and university professor, were killed when the drone hit their home just north of Kyiv.
Neighbors told Ukraine’s public broadcaster Suspilne they heard screams and tried to enter the burning home through the garage, only to discover the whole house had turned into an impassable inferno.
As US President Donald Trump pushes for “a deal” to end the war in Ukraine and and dresses down Ukraine’s president in front of reporters at the White House, Moscow every day keeps launching deadly attacks against Ukraine.
Kulyk and Ivanchov are just two of the more than 75 Ukrainian civilians who have been killed by Russia since Trump held what he called a “highly productive” phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin less than three weeks ago.
Trump said that he was convinced after the call that the Russian leader wants to end the war. “I think he wants to stop fighting. I see that. We spoke long and hard,” the US president said.
Trump berated Zelensky for allegedly not wanting to engage in diplomacy with Putin, who has repeatedly violated earlier agreements, launched an unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, and is overseeing the killing of Ukrainian civilians on a daily basis.
Speaking in front of the cameras on Friday, Trump criticized Zelensky for “the hatred he’s got for Putin” and accused him of not wanting peace, a suggestion Zelensky rejected.
And meanwhile, the fighting is continuing, and the civilian death toll is mounting in Ukraine.
Russia has launched more than 3,000 drones and at least 35 missiles at Ukraine since the phone call, according to the Ukrainian Air Force. As well as the more than 75 civilians killed, nearly 300 others, including many children, have been injured, according to a CNN count based on statements from Ukrainian officials.
Russia has consistently denied targeting civilian infrastructure, despite the ample evidence, and has pointed to the deaths on its own territory from Ukrainian attacks.
Among those killed in Ukraine in recent weeks was Olga Moroz, a baker born in 1968 who died when a Russian rocket hit the yard of her home in Kramatorsk. Local media quoted her friends as saying she was a hard worker who was always cheerful and was taking care of her elderly mother.
A Russian missile hit a building in Kryvyi Rih, crushing 21-year-old Vladimir Pimenov. Local media said the man, a talented dancer, died in hospital. Pimenov’s girlfriend was critically injured in the strike and remains in the hospital, the report said.
In the town of Bilytske, in the Donetsk region, a Russian strike on a residential building killed Yevhen and Olga Buryane, young parents of two children. Local volunteers have organized a fundraiser in support of the orphans.
Several Ukrainian civilians were killed on Friday, as Trump and Zelensky were preparing for and holding their disastrous meeting at the White House.
A civilian passenger was killed when a Russian drone hit a minibus in Kherson, according to the Ukrainian prosecutors, while two civilian men in their early 60s were killed by Russian drones cycling through the town of Lyman in eastern Ukraine.
Over the weekend, at least seven more Ukrainian civilians, including a teenager, were killed in Russian attacks.
