Today, Explained - Another phone call from Ukraine

Episode Date: February 24, 2023

On the morning Russia invaded Ukraine, we called Yulya and Kurii. A year later, we’re calling them back. This episode was produced by Victoria Chamberlin, edited by Matt Collette, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Paul Robert Mounsey, and hosted by Noel King. Additional production help from Mykola Polosin in Kyiv. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained   Support Today, Explained by making a financial contribution to Vox! bit.ly/givepodcasts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A year ago today, when Russia invaded Ukraine, we at Today Explained frantically tried to find Ukrainians to tell us what they were experiencing. In a completely random stroke of luck, we reached a man named Kury Vasyl in western Ukraine. Now, he didn't speak English, so that was a mess, but his niece, Yulia Lopushinska, did, and she agreed to translate. The two of them were proud, they were defiant, they were sure Ukraine would win. And despite everything, they were also very funny. So I asked them, could we all keep in touch? My uncle said, sure, if we are still alive. Oh dear, oh dear. Mr. Vasil.

Thank you, thank you. Glory to Ukraine. Thank you and glory to Ukraine. Get groceries delivered across the GTA from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express. Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit superstore.ca to get started. Hello? Hello, hello, yeah. Good morning, USA. Mikola, hello.

Oh, hello, Noel. Mikola Polosin is a journalist himself, and he's helping us get a better quality interview than last year's shaky phone line. And Mikola, you are there with Yulia, yes? Yes, yes, Noel, I am with Yulia here in Truskavets. Nikola and Yulia are in Truskavets, Ukraine, and 80 kilometers away is her uncle, Kuri Vasil. Hello.

Just like she did a year ago, Yulia has volunteered to translate for him. Yulia, I want to start by asking you, how are you doing? Well, today I am fine. Well, now I am fine, But the night was not very easy because this night we had the next missile attack and it was really close to our house. So the night was rough, but now we are OK. Now we are fine. What happens when a missile strikes close to your house? What do you do? Well, we just get scared. We cannot do anything, you know.

Sometimes we can go to the corridor between the two walls if it's really dangerous. So we get safe. But in general, we have nowhere to go. Yulia, how old are your children now? Almost 11, almost 6 and 2 years old. And how are they doing? The younger boys, they didn't wake up at night. But the girl, our daughter, she woke up at night and she got scared. Actually, she was the first one to wake up because of this really loud sound. That's why she got really scared. And even in the morning, she did not want to go to school because she said, if I go to school and there is air alert again, what should I do? So that's why sometimes it gets rough, but well, we get in there. I can't imagine trying to explain war to kids, frankly. What do you say?

The six-year-old, we talk to him about it a little bit, some things in general. We try to tell him to value things that we have here and especially to be really nice to the soldiers when he sees them outside in the streets. And sometimes he even, when he sees the soldier who came back from the war, he sometimes even wants to go to the soldier and to talk to him, ask some questions. And I get excited because it's nice when children understand, when children can value the situation in what we are now. And one day, the six-year-old, he told me, you know, mom, I want to be a military man when I grow up. And I was so surprised that some, well, I'm not sure if I like the idea, but at least he is not scared of them. He wants to go

to them, to talk to them, to ask some questions. And talking about our daughter, well, she's almost 11. She knows a lot because she goes to school. She talks to her friends, the teachers, well, they have to explain. And sometimes we do too. We, well, not sometimes because it's every day. This is our life nowadays. So this is everyday situation and every well, we have to talk about it. Well, this is how it is. Would you translate while I ask Kuri Vasil some questions? I'll try. Okay. Kuri Vasil, how are you?

Hello. Everything is fine. Як ваші справи? Все добре. Все добре. Все добре. Все добре. Ми живі. І кожен день вранці, коли ми ввікаємося, і ми бачимося, ми кажемо «Привіт». І коли ми безпеки і звичайні, ми щасті. Як його життя змінилося останній рік? Що він робив цього року? Питання до вас.

Як змінилося ваше життя за цей рік? І чим ви займалися? Що ви робили? Життя всіх українц Як змінилося ваше життя за цей рік і чим ви займалися? Що ви робили? Моя життя і життя кожного українця змінилося. Звісно, я робила свою роботу, свою бізнесу. І також я допомогла армії. Як він допомагає армії? my own business, and also I helped the army. How is he helping the army? Every single Ukrainian is in some kind of community which is united and around gathering things for the army, different things. Some people do gather food, like humanitarian help. Some people buy weapons. Some people buy vehicles, military vehicles, drones. And this is what every single Ukrainian is doing right now. And we are united around that. Yulia, I hear your uncle saying that his life is different in the sense that he's really thrown

himself into the war effort, into organizing. What's the biggest difference in your life from a year ago? Well, before the war, sometimes I thought that maybe I would love to live abroad. Maybe I would love my kids to see the world. Well, it's not bad to see the world, but I wanted them to live there, to discover the world. But now I want to travel the world, but I want to live in Ukraine. I want to stay here to raise my kids, to bring them up here in my country. That makes a lot of sense. I wonder, Yulia, and I'll ask your uncle this question and then I'll ask you, do you think that Ukraine is going to win this war? Питання таке, як Ви думаєте, чи Україна виграє цю війну? Україна виграла війну перші три дні. to stand against. And now it's not the question if we win the war.

The question is how many, how much more, how many people, soldiers, young people will die in this war. But the main idea, what my uncle is trying to tell you, is that Ukraine cannot, may not, will not lose in this war if Ukraine loses the world, the whole civilization loses. Yulia, what do you think about this question? Well, I agree with my uncle. I don't think that it's the war only between Russia and Ukraine. So I think it's because if Ukraine loses, then the next is Europe.

You and your uncle both see this as a world war. It's Russia against the rest of the world. Do you think the rest of the world is paying enough attention to Ukraine? No, not enough. Not enough attention. Yeah, yeah, I could hear that one without translation. Even without translation, it's clear. If to talk about this war only as the war between Russia and Ukraine,

it's really dangerous because if Ukraine loses the war, it means that Russia will go further on. And I am here today, well, my uncle says that I am here today. I give you this, well, almost one hour of my valuable time, and I'm asking you to talk about it, not to forget that somewhere in the world, people, they die, they fight for freedom, they want to live in a free country. That's why I am asking you now to talk about it, to not to forget about it. And then after that hour of Kudy and Yulia's valuable time, it was time for us all to go. My uncle says thank you and he is ready to join you anytime. Good, good.

What if we check in six months from today? You'll both still be in Lviv? Alive? No, Yulia. You're always making dark jokes. Six months is a really long time for Ukrainians because every time, every, well, evening, we go to sleep when we don't know, we wake up in the morning.

My uncle says that maybe it's better to do it, do it more often. How about three months? Three months is okay? Good. Okay. He says okay. Coming up a year to the day after we interviewed journalist Igor Kosov,

who'd come straight from sheltering in the subway, we asked where his reporting took him this past year. Support for Today Explained comes from Aura. Aura believes that sharing pictures is a great way to keep up with family, and Aura says it's never been easier thanks to their digital picture frames. They were named the number one digital photo frame by Wirecutter. Aura frames make it easy to share unlimited photos and videos directly from your phone to the frame. When you give an aura frame as a gift, you can personalize it.

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with iGaming Ontario. Why don't we begin with your full name, of course, and what you do? Yeah, it's been a minute. I'm Igor Krasov. I'm a reporter at the Key of Independence. I covered many different topics, mostly revolving around the war for the past year. You and I talked almost exactly a year ago, and at that time, I remember you had just come up above ground. You'd been sheltering in the subway station. I had to stop by my apartment, but I was earlier taking shelter in a subway station because there was a threat, a credible threat of a possible bombing of Kiev.

What has life been like since then for the last year? Thanks for leading off with a short and easy to answer question. No, but seriously, at first it was a bit tense. Everyone was trying to get out of the city to Western Ukraine. Some were going to Europe. People are sheltering or some people were staying put. When the Battle of Kiev started, the war opened up, as we know, with the paratrooper attacks on Hostomel Airport near Kiev. And they were supposed to kill the leadership, secure Kiev, and then the rest of the troops were supposed to roll in and occupy the country. A senior lieutenant who goes by Starsky was one of the defenders

and says Russia attacked with 34 helicopters. Ukraine shot some down, but not all. And so the Ukrainian commanders shelled the runway to prevent the invasion force of airborne troops from landing. The spearhead attack immediately failed runway to prevent the invasion force of airborne troops from landing. The spearhead attack immediately failed and then the sort of the grinding more started and during that time Kyiv's population was down to half everything was kind of closed except delis and supermarkets rather and pharmacies and life was pretty tense. There was explosions in the distance all the time. But people were just kind of like I imagine the Brits in World War II.

There was a lot of keeping calm and carrying on going on that I saw. Then the Russians got out. There was a brief rejoicing until everyone saw what they left in Bucha, you know. Their bodies lie face up, hands bound, mouths contorted. The men all allegedly killed by Russian soldiers. These bodies are now being taken away for burial. An official involved in the process said that over the past few weeks here in Bucha, he's found around 300 bodies.

He said about 30% of them were women and children, and he believes that more are going to be found. But after that, life in Kiev region got back to normal. In the summer, you could almost think that there was no war going on at all, since all the action was concentrated in Donbass. We sort of got back to the early days when Russia started, decided it's going to use missiles and drones to destroy the power plants and the energy infrastructure. And we started getting missile attacks and drone attacks every week, every two weeks.

Russia has ruthlessly been targeting Ukraine's energy grid and is being accused of weaponizing winter by plunging huge parts of the country into cold and darkness. People also kind of started off by taking shelter, but after a while, it's just, you know, there's just, it takes too much out of your day. You got to get things done. People just walking around, delivering food, driving. I don't even take shelter.

I just keep working. Huh? Yeah. I mean, I used to sit in the hallway in the first couple of months, but now I'm just sort of, you know, that's just officially I wouldn't recommend that to people. But this is just how life is here. Everyone's just tired of it and used to it. And yeah, missiles kill people. And that's just something people have gotten used to. You spend time reporting on volunteers in Kiev. Can you tell me about that?

I was monitoring the crossing from where the Russians were. Ukrainian forces were holding them back. Ukrainians were trickling across. And Russians sometimes hit them with artillery. This guy shows up, just swerves up on this old silver van, you know, jumps out and yells, I need a medic. So I jogged over to one of the soldiers. They got a medic.

There were two bodies in there. I helped him carry one of them. It was a friend of the guy that I met. So we started talking and then he told me that him and his friend, Andri, go to the areas that have not fully been liberated. And they evacuate people, bring them into Kiev, which was very safe, kind of a fortress. So I decided to go with them on one of their daily missions. And it was one of the most incredible things I've ever experienced. We evacuated a bunch of people and pets. We got into some misadventures. That day, it was probably from

their point of view was boring because we got murdered once. And from their point of view, it was pretty boring. But from my point of view, I saw everything. It was like the humor, the pain, the destruction, the hope, the quiet grace and nobility, the defiance. I saw all of that. and that was just one example. I saw volunteers who held Kherson together during occupation. They fed people. They kept getting harassed by the Russians who were in charge. Yeah, there was a lot of that going around. Listen, I want to ask you about what you saw in Kherson, because I know you wrote a big piece about these detention centers and what happened in them. Can you talk to me about what you witnessed there and what people who you spoke to told you had happened? It was like this pretrial detention center. It was a jail, basically. Ukrainian police held alleged criminals there, then they went to court. And this was converted into a detention center for suspected collaborators, guerrillas, spies, you know, all this stuff.

I spoke to people who were detained there. There were these various cells with doors on them instead of bars. Pretty dingy place. And people said that there was screaming coming from it every day. There were children nearby. Yeah, so the children were like, oh, yeah, we heard screaming all the time. Like the people in the other cells were like, yeah, when we heard the screaming, we couldn't really eat the food. It was hard to eat.

The types of interrogation under torture that I heard about personally was electric shock. That was a popular one. Two guys I talked to, they were shocked. And one of them has concentration problems now. There were some beatings, just, you know, generic beatings. Basically, dark, dingy place. You get taken in. You were held there until they checked out your stuff. Many people then later got released. They would drive them somewhere, dump them out, tell them to count to 30, and then only then they could remove the hood from their head and try to get home and figure out where they are. What were these people accused of? Why were they in detention centers? The Russians believe they had done what? like transporting weapons, maybe assassinating people, maybe giving coordinates of important targets, you're going to be paranoid and you're going to be always on the hunt for guerrillas and

spies that are helping the Ukrainian armed forces. And there were a lot of such people there and many of them were unfortunately caught and tortured. I did a story in December, from November to December, I talked to a couple of people who did this kind of underground resistance work. It was very clandestine in cells. It was horrifying. I wouldn't be able to do that. You need an unbreakable spinal cord, I would think, to do that kind of work. You know that the U.S. government recently said that Russia has committed war crimes in Ukraine. We have examined the evidence.

And there is no doubt these are crimes against humanity. In your reporting, did you see evidence of what we would consider to be war crimes? Yeah, I saw bodies piled into, you know, little piles. One of them had been set on fire. I've seen, I've interviewed people of civilians whose loved ones were just shot for either for no reason or because they were deemed a threat or just because they were at the wrong place at the wrong time. Thousands and thousands of children have been forcibly taken from their families, deported to Russia and placed with foster families there. Other Ukrainian adults have also

been forcibly sent to Russia. That's a war crime. What do you expect next? I would say the offensive is already underway. You could see the casualty numbers coming out of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts. But that's their thing right now. They're really trying their best to take those two regions to the borders. And after that, I'm not sure, but they're going to have extreme trouble with this. Because even though a lot of Ukrainian troops are going to die, we'll be willing to bet that even more Russian forces are going to die and lose their equipment. And it's just going to be horrific, sort of meat grinder type of situation. I hear you saying this war is just going to keep going the way it has gone. Meat grinder is one of those awful terms that we've heard applied to this situation from the beginning. And the push and pull of Ukrainian and Russian forces is something we've been aware of from the beginning. Nothing's better, is what I hear you saying. You don't expect anything to get better.

Well, what do you mean better? I mean, I think that when this war started, there was a sense that, you know, for a while in the beginning, it was like Russia did not take Kiev, Ukraine can win. But then as the casualties mounted, as the evidence of torture mounted, as the children, as you said, I mean, children being displaced, horrible things happening to kids. I guess you look for some sense after a year that things might be moving in a more definitive direction. And I don't hear you saying that they are. We can't say. If I were to make a guess, I would say that the war will not end in 2023 because Russia really won't give it up. And now

they can't give it up because it would be absolutely humiliating to acknowledge some kind of defeat. I don't think it's going to end in this year. Russia's going to keep trying. There's another wave of mobilization possibly going on, possibly about to be announced. The fact that they didn't take Kyiv, that was sort of the death of their ambition to take over the whole country. So now they can only take part of the country, but that's still unacceptable. So Ukraine definitely can still win. It's highly possible that with more support that Ukraine will be able to wreak havoc in Crimea even. And Ukraine can win, absolutely,

but the damage has been colossal. And the question is, how much more damage is there going to be in human lives and cities, destroyed infrastructure livelihoods human lives economy and how much it's going to cost to then fix that all up everyone realizes that it's not going to be a quick victory. It's going to be long, it's going to be messy, and I'm just going to have to go through it. That song is Oiu Luzi Černova Kalina, sung by Ukrainian refugees now staying in Vilnius, Lithuania. We had production help on today's show from Mikola Polisen. Today's episode was produced by Victoria Chamberlain and edited by Matthew Collette.

It was engineered by Paul Robert Mounsey and fact-checked by Laura Buller. I'm Noelle King. It's Today Explained. Покилилася, що ось наша славна Україна зажурилася.