Heroes’ funerals is sombre reminder of war for Lviv
LVIV may be far from the eastern frontline but for some Ukrainian soldiers it is their final resting place.
Close to the border with Poland, Lviv is one of the least affected by the war in Ukraine. Businesses have reopened and a sense of normality has returned.
Hundreds of mourners at the city’s Lychakiv Cemetery paid their last respects to two lost in the conflict.
Sergeant Andriy Banakh, 45, died on June 20, while Second Lieutenant Oleg Vorobyov, also 45, died on May 30.The officer left a wife and two children.
Military personnel led the procession, followed by priests and friends and family with coffins draped in Ukraine’s flag.
Mourners sobbed, sang and paid tribute to the men, as a military band played.
Kyiv says up to 200 of its soldiers are being killed every
Rockets
day while local media has reported that at least 2,500 Ukrainian military have been killed in the four months since the war began.
Ihor, a guard at the Lychakiv Cemetery, said that military burials were becoming a regular occurrence, despite some delays in recovering the bodies.
He said: “Sometimes someone who was dead for three weeks already, they are just now being recognised and delivered here.”
Officials said four people were injured last Saturday when four missiles hit a military facility in the Lviv region. However, two Kremlin rockets were shot down.
A similar March strike on a military base in the area killed 35 and injured over 130 others.
Analysts say Monday’s attack that killed at least 20 on a shopping centre in the central-eastern city of Kremenchuk is a message from Moscow that “nowhere in Ukraine is safe”.