Taras Levchenko is a breaking news correspondent for RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service.
When pensioner Valentyn Didkovskiy saw a Russian column rolling past his house on February 27, he picked up a captured grenade launcher and blew up a fuel truck, sending the invasion into chaos and captured the destruction in a mobile-phone video.
Viktoriya Sluzhenko wanted to take up a rifle to defend the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, when Russian troops invaded her country in February. But she quickly realized the animals of the Kyiv Zoo needed her more.
U.S. Rep. Adam Smith told RFE/RL that Russian President Vladimir Putin "is a profound threat not just to Ukraine, but to world peace and stability." Smith made the comments on July 23 during a visit to Kyiv with several other members of Congress.
Oleksandr Kraskivskiy, head of the village of Zamhlay in Ukraine's Chernihiv region, says he tried to reason with occupying Russian troops but he ended up being bound, beaten, and held captive. Kraskivskiy believes he survived after explaining that he had served with the Soviet Army in Afghanistan.
Even as fighting continues, Ukrainian engineers have begun the huge task of dealing with the unexploded ordinance scattered across the country. This includes clearing bodies of water. RFE/RL joined a team of divers and sappers at a lake in Horenka, near Kyiv, on May 27.
Burned-out armored vehicles, notebook doodles, shattered weapons, and the wreckage of a fighter jet are among items belonging to the Russian military to go on display at Ukraine's National Military History Museum in Kyiv.
RFE/RL correspondent Taras Levchenko reports from the villages of Sukachi and Ivankiv, northwest of the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, and speaks to local residents about their battle to save each other and save the paintings of renowned Ukrainian folk artist Maria Prymachenko.
An 87-year-old Elvira Borts survived the Holocaust and Nazi siege of Leningrad but says the destruction of Mariupol by Russian forces is worse than what she experienced during World War II.
