Four years of war in Ukraine have left millions displaced and grieving for lost homes and loved ones, with many fearing they will never return.
DZENZELIVKA: Halyna Popriadukhina has fled her home three times since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in 2022. The 65-year-old now lives in a ramshackle, abandoned house in central Ukraine, hundreds of kilometres from her occupied hometown.
“I’m afraid there’s nowhere else to escape,” she said, her voice heavy with exhaustion. One of her sons is missing in action, while the other is likely held by Russian forces.
Popriadukhina is among nearly 4 million people displaced within Ukraine. More than 5 million others have fled to Europe as the war grinds into its fifth year.
Many fear they will never see their homes or loved ones again. Control of the Donbas region is now at the heart of US-backed peace talks to end Europe’s biggest conflict since World War Two.
Russia demands that Kyiv cede the remaining 20% of Donetsk it hasn’t conquered. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has refused, despite saying US mediators advised him it could secure peace.
“We can’t just withdraw,” Zelenskiy said this week. “We have to understand that Donbas is a part of our independence.”
Popriadukhina was milking cows when missiles began flying on 24 February 2022. She reluctantly fled on her son’s urging, leaving behind her home and critical livestock.
“I didn’t take anything from there. Everything was lost,” said the former collective farmworker.
She returned to Donetsk in summer 2022, only to flee again last March as Russian forces advanced. Her trajectory mirrors Russia’s grinding gains, which now see it occupying about one-fifth of Ukraine.
“I don’t need their little Russia,” she said, using a derisive Ukrainian term for Moscow’s territorial ambitions.
While Kyiv’s troops have held back a breakthrough, aid groups warn internal refugees are struggling. The Norwegian Refugee Council said families are resorting to risky solutions as aid dwindles and savings run out.
Popriadukhina once refused an offer of passage to Poland. “I said I won’t leave my country,” she stated.
She is haunted by her sons’ fates. One was in a Mariupol hospital when Russian forces swept in, and the other went missing in 2023 after enlisting.
Kyiv says over 70,000 Ukrainian soldiers and civilians remain missing in the war. “Honestly, if I could, I would tear him apart with my own hands, that Putin,” Popriadukhina said.
“He brought suffering to so many people.” Recalling finding a young man killed by shrapnel outside her home, she asked, “How can you forgive this?”
