In the first weeks of the full-scale invasion, occupiers’ checkpoints were set up around the village of Osokorivka, and the Russian military themselves began to rob and intimidate the local population, — village head Serhii Kunets, who himself spent three weeks in a torture chamber, speaks about occupation.

Valentyna Lysenko is a writer who has lived almost her entire life in Borodianka, in the Kyiv Region. Together with her family, she endured several air raids and miraculously survived. The woman recalls how people in the basement of a destroyed house nearby begged for help for five days, but the Russians forbade saving them.

Vitalii Koretskyi is a resident of the Kopyliv village in the Kyiv Region. He says that he mainly saw Buryats in the village. His neighbor died when, out of desperation, he tried to drive out through a mined field, and his nephew and friend were found shot with their hands tied.

The tiles in Stepan’s yard are riddled with bullet marks left by the Russian helicopter pilot. His property burned to the ground. Fortunately, the dog managed to survive the terrible burns. The Russians tortured his neighbor, Hryhorii, and eventually killed him, as well as two peaceful women who simply ran down the street.

Olha Smykovska lives in the Kyiv Region in the village of Kopyliv. In the first days of the war, the Russians dropped an aerial bomb near the woman’s house. Olha’s son went to war to defend Ukraine and was seriously wounded. And then she lost her daughter.

Tetiana Lukianenko is a resident of the village of Zahaltsi, Kyiv Region. A slab fell on a woman while she was hiding with her dog and son in a cellar during the bombing. The family moved to the summer pavilion when suddenly the Russians showed up.

Olena Atrashkova is a resident of the Kopyliv village in the Kyiv Region. The woman survived the occupation and witnessed the Russians breaking locks and robbing the post office. The shock wave knocked out the door to her house, and she, with the children, had to hide from the bombings with their neighbors. Olena says the worst thing was when nine Russians burst into the summer kitchen while she was there.

Mikhailo worked as a sound engineer at the Mariupol Drama Theater. He was seriously injured in his yard. In conditions of constant shelling and lack of electricity and medicine, Mariupol doctors managed to save Mikhailo’s leg. But there was no one to help his mother.

Olha Myroshnychenko was born in Izium (Kharkiv Region). The young woman survived a six-month occupation of her home town. She says she always believed the enemy would run away. So she was not afraid to tell the Russians everything she thought about them.

Serhii Radchenko from the village of Makariv is 70 years old. Despite his age, he and his neighbors were forced to independently repair the roof and restore order in the house that had been damaged by Russian shelling. He says the apartment still floods, and sometimes he has to pick out 15 buckets of water.

During active hostilities, an enemy shell almost destroyed the ancestral house of the village Makariv resident, Volodymyr Tokar. His cousin was captured in Mariupol. The man returned home in the fall of 2022 as part of a prisoner exchange, when 215 Ukrainians were exchanged for Viktor Medvedchuk and 55 occupiers.

Halyna Koretska lives with her husband in the village of Kopyliv, Kyiv Region. Barely holding back her tears, Halyna wanders around the house, which two enemy Grads [multiple propelled rockets] destroyed. The woman remembers where the pictures she loved to embroider and the flowerpots were. “But the house is not important,” — says Halyna — “The Russians killed my nephew.”

“We made a fire outside to cook food or drink tea. We were hungry all the time,” says a resident of Vuhledar (a town in Donetsk Region).

Olena Petrivna Kulynovych lives in the village of Horenka, Kyiv Region. Her house was hit by an enemy shell. She left Horenka for a while but eventually returned. Now she lives without electricity, water and gas supply...

Anton Siryk is a resident of the Makariv village in the Kyiv Region. In the first days of the war, enemy artillery began to destroy the settlement. Part of the high-rise building where the family lived was destroyed. “The weather is gray and cloudy, and dogs are running, attacking cats. There is slate lying around; glass and cars are broken,” — this is how the man describes his first impressions of what he saw.

Nataliia Atrashkova is a resident of the village of Kopyliv in the Kyiv Region. From the first days of a full-scale war, the town was occupied by the Russians. Natalia escaped from hell, but her brother did not. The invaders killed him.

Today, the village of Hroza in the Kharkiv Region is known in Ukraine and beyond its borders. On 5 October, a Russian missile killed 59 of its residents. The men, who allegedly pointed lethal weapons at civilians, tortured the son of Larysa Shevchenko (name changed for security reasons).

During the occupation, Valentyn Hryshchenko delivered humanitarian aid to his fellow villagers, and even stole a damaged fuel truck from the invaders and delivered its fuel to a local hospital and a nursing home. The Russians captured Valentyn and tortured him in a basement: they hit him with rifle butt and imitated his execution. The fuel truck was later handed over to the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

Anatolii Levchenko is a well-known theater director in Mariupol. On 20 May 2022, the occupiers arrested him for his pro-Ukrainian views. The man was accused of inciting hatred, extremism, and terrorism, and even calling for the Kremlin arson because he posted on Facebook a chewing gum wrapper, “Love is...”.

Iryna Marchenko is a medical worker. The consequences of the Russian occupation did not pass without a trace for her. She admits she still experiences fear, is afraid of loud sounds, and cannot listen to music with headphones because she needs to hear what is happening around her. The woman complains that no one is in a hurry to restore houses in the village. Where it is broken, it remains broken.