Front Burner - Inside Ukraine — a country living with war

Episode Date: September 8, 2022

The view of the war from inside Ukraine varies depending on where you are. For two weeks, CBC News senior correspondent Susan Ormiston has been crossing the country where the war has become a normal part of life for some. In the capital of Kyiv, businesses are re-opening, communities are rebuilding, and some who fled at the start of the war have returned. Meanwhile, in Kherson and Kharkiv, fierce fighting continues as Ukraine’s counteroffensive reportedly ramps up. The Ukrainians say they’re making good progress, but Russia denies this, saying Ukraine is suffering heavy losses. An ongoing media blackout makes it hard to get a clear picture. Today on Front Burner, Susan Ormiston shows us the complicated reality in Ukraine as the war grinds on.

In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. This is a CBC Podcast. Hello, I'm Jamie Poisson. Today, we're talking to my colleague Susan Ormiston. She's been traveling around Ukraine for the past several weeks, and we're going to talk about the state of the counteroffensive in the South,

what came of the UN's visit to Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, and hear from Ukrainians who, in the midst of a protracted war, are trying to rebuild their lives and country. Susan, hi. Thank you. Thank you very much for being with me today. Hi, Jamie. How are you? I'm good, thank you. How are you doing? It's been a long two weeks for you. I know. We're good. We've traveled many, many hundreds of kilometers around Ukraine, trying to get a sense of where this country is, you know, half a year into this horrible war. And I know it must seem like a lifetime ago for you, because I know you started in Kiev,

but I wonder if we could start our conversation there, because just six months ago, people in Kiev were living in terror as Russia moved towards the city. But when you were there, what were your impressions of what daily life is like there now? Yeah, it's so interesting to go back to a story six months later. It's kind of like a good mark. And it was also Independence Day in Ukraine when we were there. So memorable time and day for this country. And I was struck by Kyiv. It's recovered in many ways. It's rebounding. There's a curfew at night as there is in much of Ukraine. is in much of Ukraine. But during the day, people are out about, they're in restaurants, in hotels, they are trying to work. Tourism is completely almost gone. But they are rebuilding a new life in the capital city. And, you know, the hedgehogs that we saw guarding the roads and the many of the checkpoints are not manned anymore. Some of them are in the

entrances to the city, but inside the city, there's easier movement. I was struck on a Sunday morning coming out of the hotel and seeing all these families in squares right around the hotel in central Kiev, looking at these carcasses of Russian military equipment that have been brought into the capital and displayed like a show of Ukrainian resilience and resistance. And people were taking pictures and posing and selfies and kids were climbing all over them. It was both disturbing and amazing to see people out and sort of reclaiming their strength in the capital of this country. Right. There's like a bit of a defiance to it. Is that fair? More than a bit. More than a bit. And a sense of we're still united. We're still repelling

the Russian invaders. We're still here. And now we're trying to figure out what the new normal looks like in Ukraine for cities like Kyiv, like Lviv, who, for the most part, are not fearing Russian tanks at their doorsteps immediately. I know you also went to Irpin, a city near Kyiv that had been so badly damaged in the earlier days of the invasion. And what did you find there? Irpin, you remember that bridge where people were cowering underneath? It had been severed. They were trying to flee Irpin to get away from the attack.

You know, some very tragic, brutal moments there. That bridge is being rebuilt. There's a crane there. They're building a road around it. moments there. That bridge is being rebuilt. There's a crane there. They're building a road around it. In Irpin, these apartment blocks that are still charred with these empty eyes for windows staring out at the street, some of the worst ones are still vacant and they'll be torn down. But others where there was limited damage, maybe a corner of a roof, for example, people have moved back in. The one we were in,

they had already replaced all the windows with double pane windows, like you might do in a home renovation. We met a couple in Neerpeen who had spent their life savings on a renovation of a beautiful, small, but beautiful top floor apartment for their young son. And a rocket had come right through his bedroom. They had fled before that, thankfully, but they were back trying to figure out, okay, do we fix this? They'd put a tarpaulin over the hole so as not to get rain damage into the boy's room, but they were back collecting toys and belongings and trying to figure out how to find the money, how to find the time to start over, to rebuild. Can you move back here? Maybe. When all this is renewed, I don't want to take my kid back here to see all this.

But in their community, you know, with these pockets of damage, people are living again with this faith that once pushed out, at least on the ground, street by street fighting there, that the Russians will not come back. I understand you spoke to a woman who fled the country back in March, but has since returned. And with that fear in mind, like, what did she tell you about why she decided to come back? Fascinating story, Olena. I met her in March in Lviv in the train station. March 3rd, I remember it was my birthday, where the thousands of people were crushed into the train station,

trying, panicked to leave the country, leaving their husbands and fathers and brothers behind because men still can't travel out of the country. And Olena was there, crouched on the ground with her toddler in her arms and her mother, you know, with a toque on her head. And somehow our producer, Sylvia Thompson, found her in this crowd of humanity. And she spoke English and she was trying to get to Canada. And she talked to us about making the trip from just outside Kiev that day by train, fearful, leaving her husband behind, crying as she told us she didn't want to go. The story we've heard so many times, she was going to Poland and then trying to get to Canada. Well, a story we've heard so many times.

She was going to Poland and then trying to get to Canada. Well, Olena is back. She returned about a month ago. She said, I didn't like living as a refugee. My immigration status was stalled for Canada. And she said, I felt guilty. I was thinking about all of the people in Ukraine, about my husband. I really had some feelings of guiltiness. So like I felt guiltiness for being there and for being safe. You felt guilty? Yeah, I felt guilty for being

safe. I don't know. It's some kind of psychological, I guess, concern or issue. But, you know, that was the feeling inside, actually. So I really felt guilty for all of my people which you know staying here and which are suffering of all of this actually you know consequences and all of this conditions and she confessed to me that although she's back and happy she's still anxious she has panic attacks she can't go to a shelter because she fears, she has such anxiety about the war that it makes her claustrophobic. And so she's trying to rebuild her life, as so many I spoke to are now. Okay, this is war. It's ongoing. There's no sign of it stopping. We're here in Ukraine. What do we do?

Yeah, it's so overwhelming to think of how difficult the work of piecing your life back together is. It's really awful. I know you're also in Bucha, which we've talked about on this show quite a bit. Of course, people might remember Bucha as the site where the Russians have been accused of perpetrating war crimes. The outside world could see of Russia's occupation of Bucha and nearby areas was lifted over the weekend after Ukraine declared it had recaptured territory. What it revealed has shocked the world. Bodies, seemingly of civilians, lying in the streets. A mass grave has been reported in a churchyard.

What was Bucha like? Well, if you're like me, I didn't go to Bucha in March. Our colleague Margaret Evans and her team was there in early April when those graves, those mass graves were uncovered. But I remember seeing the vision of Bucha as dark. Dark and ugly and brutal and terrorized. And we went back. Parts of Bucha are traumatized, there's no question. We visited with the priest. He was the one who organized for a mass grave be built in his churchyard behind the

church because there was nowhere to put the bodies. And they excavated and put bodies in black plastic bags in there for a time. Since then, those bodies have now been recovered and put in a proper resting place in the Bucha Cemetery we went out and visited. And there are brand new fresh graves with fresh plastic flowers. They're all looking very similar. So a stark reminder of the atrocities that occurred in Bucha. And the priest told me that for sure his congregation, one of the choristers in his church, was one of those murdered. And they're traumatized and they'll never forget. The pain is there.

They're traumatized, and they'll never forget. The pain is there. But again, in other parts of Bucha, we went to get a little bit of lunch at a restaurant. It was open, a fish restaurant. It was as normal as you would find in any Canadian city. So there's these two faces of Ukraine presenting themselves with this underlying trauma of what they've been through. The priest put up a display inside his church of the scenes outside his church with these mass graves. And I said, why would you do this? And he said, I want people to remember. I want people to remember what happened here and not let it fade away.

And that is an emotion, Jamie, that many people spoke to us about, And that is an emotion, Jamie, that many people spoke to us about, which is there's a danger in normalizing the war that's going on in Ukraine today. Because if you are in Lviv, for example, which was hopping, extremely busy, tourism there resuming, Ukrainian likely or Eastern European, European for sure. But that face is one, and then you still have, you know, here I am in the South right now of ongoing attacks, rockets, missiles, terrorizing the population. So people who said, yes, there is a normalization of the war, but we must push against that too, because that has its own dangers. In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization. Empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections.

Hi, it's Ramit Sethi here. You may have seen my money show on Netflix. I've been talking about money for 20 years. I've talked to millions of people, and I have some startling numbers to share with you. Did you know that of the people I speak to, 50% of them do not know their own household income? That's not a typo. 50%. That's because money is confusing.

In my new book and podcast, Money for Couples, I help you and your partner create a financial vision together. To listen to this podcast, just search for Money for Couples. I help you and your partner create a financial vision together. To listen to this podcast, just search for Money for Couples. Let's talk about what's happening in the South because the picture is very different there, right? And so one of the places that you've been is Kharkiv. What did you find there? What's Kharkiv like right now? Well, Kharkiv has had this history since March of massive destruction. This is a place you may remember from images of, you know, large populated apartment buildings being completely gutted, you know, missiles through the middle of them. And those still exist and they have been abandoned.

What struck me about Kharkiv is we were only there a couple of days, and on one day, this random shelling, five rockets in one day, in the morning, in daylight, hit residential areas. One was near a daycare playground. The kids, thankfully, had been evacuated from there since March, but two teachers were wounded. One was an apartment block, you know, sheared off the front of a local pharmacy, destroyed. And what you see is it's so regular in a place like Kharkiv that the city sends out workers with brooms and wheelbarrows and shovels, and they're there almost immediately cleaning up, trying to almost make it like it didn't happen or like, you know, taking away the disturbing image of this destruction and rubble

for the city residents. And it's so numbingly routine. They just go with their brooms and they get going right away on this terrible task. In this case, no one was killed, thankfully. But this happens day after day after day in places like Kharkiv. Russia wants that city. It's considered a gateway to the east. It's only 40 kilometers from the Russian border. It's a treasure, if you will, for Russia, and they are not going to give up bombarding it. And the people in Kharkiv, the people that are left in this shell of a city, really, are just trying to live and resist this and stay there. In terms of what else is happening in that area, you know, I know that Ukraine is claiming that they've launched this counteroffensive in the south. They're trying to reclaim cities that actually did fall to Russia, like Kherson, right?

A port city in the south. And how is that going for them? I think we have to be careful about how we characterize this counteroffensive. You know, the government announced this about 10 days ago. about 10 days ago, there was something new, a new offensive that Ukrainians were trying to degrade the Russian positions in the south, for example, around Kherson, between where I am now, Mikhailov and Kherson, trying to sort of destroy Russian ammunition depots, their logistics teams, you know, bridges to cross the river, trying to make it difficult for them to resupply and refortify their positions in places like Kherson, which has been occupied by Russians since March.

But the government was very cautious to Ukrainians and to media saying to Ukrainians, don't expect we're going to roll in and retake a place like Kherson. That's not what we're doing. Have you gained any ground yet? It's a very difficult war. And it's a very difficult task. We will renew our territory. We cannot freeze this conflict now. The society is very decisive in what we need to step by step de-occupy our territory. This task is difficult and it doesn't only depend on us, but I'm sure that is what will happen.

It's only a matter of time. They either said that because they can't do it or because this is not the strategy they're employing, probably both. But it's not a, you know, marching across territory, gaining every day. And the complicating factor here is it's really changed the reporting of the battlefield space, Jamie. You know, about a week after we got here, the Ukrainian army to all media, and there was a lot of international media and local media here, of course, and said, we are imposing sweeping restrictions. There will be no embeds with the Ukrainian military.

There will be no access to the battlefront, particularly in the southern part of Ukraine. So it's very hard for anyone to verify what gains or losses have occurred. And there's limited reporting about where those are. And they sent the same message to Ukrainians. Give us silence. Give us space. We need to do this strategically.

And we don't want you blogging about it, talking about it. So it is extremely difficult to get through the fog of war here to find out exactly what is going on with that offensive, which is still very active. One other big part of the story that I wanted to ask you about today is a story that has been in the headlines quite a lot this week, actually. And that's the situation in Zaporizhia at the nuclear plant. What is the plant and why is it so important in all of this? Well, Zaporizhia supplies 20% of Ukraine's power. It's Europe's largest nuclear plant. It's strategically very important to Russians who seized the plant and the area around the plant in Inarhodar, which is the city which houses the plant. And it's been a battlefield intensively really since August, but even months before where Russia has accused Ukraine of shelling the plant. Ukraine has said that Russia is using it as a

military shield that they have stored, and that's now been verified. They've stored Russian military equipment inside the turbine buildings, on some of the turbines. There have been damage from the shelling in Zaporizhia buildings. We just had the UN watchdog, the nuclear watchdog, visit the plant last week and told us they saw a big hole in the roof of a building that houses fresh nuclear fuel. They saw holes in the sides of buildings by shelling around the plant.

And everyone is extremely worried that this will end in some kind of catastrophic nuclear accident. So that's why the Atomic Energy Agency went in last week. What did we learn from the agency? They had a report, right? Yeah, the agency has been telling us about what they learned over a period of a number of days since their visit last Wednesday. And essentially, they've said that the plant has been compromised in that the shelling has impacted the plant. Nuclear radiation levels have not risen in the area during this time, but they worry that something will happen accidentally or deliberately. We are playing with fire and something very, very catastrophic could take place.

two atomic energy inspectors inside the plant, hoping for a more reliable, neutral reporting of what's going on. The plant is controlled by Russia, but run effectively by Ukrainian nuclear workers. And even that is a pressure point, according to the agency, because the Ukrainians obviously are under pressure. They called it an untenable situation. So what Ukraine wants is they want a demilitarized zone around the plant. Russia has so far refused. The atomic agency has supported that there be a neutral zone established around this. This is a war. One side has controlled it. They want to keep it. And the other side wants them to give it up. And so far, there has been little movement there. And I can tell you, since the IAEA visited the plant, there are allegations of more shelling around that plant. We get notifications, alerts every day saying Russia, saying that Ukraine is shelling and saying Russia is shelling.

The plant has been taken offline because of problems at the plant and then restarted. It seems like a very precarious situation, spite of the observers visiting and telling the world, the UN Security Council, on Tuesday, that something has to be done here. Any damage could spell catastrophe, not only for the immediate vicinity, but for the region and beyond. but for the region and beyond.

Susan, before we go today, you told us about Ukrainians that are returning to their homes and are embarking on the incredibly difficult and onerous task now of rebuilding their lives. But you also spoke to people from inside a local shelter who recently fled the fighting. And what did they tell you? These are people who stuck it out for six months,

who believed that in their little corner of Ukraine, this was a villager, they could withstand the battle, that it wouldn't come so close that they'd have to get out. In fact, they did. In the last few days, the front is shifting. The fight is moving. And it sort of rolls over villages and areas where people are still living. Not many, but some. They're being encouraged now to evacuate areas like this because Ukraine is trying to push forward and Russia is repelling that. But this older woman said, I finally had to get out.

I was living in the basement. I was being shelled every day. She said, I'll never forget Ukrainian soldiers who came. She said, my eyes bulged out of my head when I saw a Ukrainian tank. She thanked them for helping rescue her. So my takeaway is, and she wasn't the only one, that although we're not seeing the thousands of people moving, evacuating the east and the South like we did in March. There are still hundreds on the move, and these are people who believe they could stay and they can't. So this was surprising to me that the country is still in flux. There's still displaced people moving around, trying to find new lives, being scared out of their wits,

some losing family members in shelling in villages and just saying, I've got to pack up my family and get out of here. We spoke to a family who finally left Melitopol. He said, after being under occupation for five months, I just can't take it anymore. I had to get out. So they made a perilous journey through checkpoints to get out to Ukrainian territory, and they're going to move on to Poland. So we're still seeing this movement. And I think if there's one thing that I will take away from our nearly three weeks here at this time is that there are many faces to Ukraine. They're different. They're changing.

There are many faces to Ukraine. They're different. They're changing. But in some, you have the active fight, the active bombardment, like here in Mykolaiv and some of the areas in the south and east, Luhansk and Donetsk, where people are still living the fear and terror of an ongoing battle. And then you have Kiev and Lviv, these large cities, which are resuming their lives as much as they can, where people are moving back, claiming their spaces and trying to figure out how to navigate a protracted war. Susan, thank you for this. As always, thank you so much. You're welcome, Jamie. Thanks for asking.

All right, that is all for today. I'm Jamie Poisson. Thanks so much for listening to FrontBurner, and we'll talk to you tomorrow. For more CBC Podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.