As the Russian military invasion continued, a Ukrainian woman living in Sapporo talked about her feelings about the family left in her hometown.

Ukrainian Veronica Kurakova (27) came to Japan, got married and lived in Sapporo, and this time she responded to an interview asking her to know the situation in her hometown.



Zaporizhia, in the southeastern part of her birthplace, is next to Donetsk Oblast, where the violent attacks continue, leaving her mother, Natalia (53), in her home in her hometown.



Her only daughter, Veronica, kept in touch with her mother every day, and she was contacted by videophone from her mother saying she was on her way home from her blood donation for the day.



She said she donated blood because her mother usually doesn't donate because she has a chronic illness, but she said she needed blood for transfusion.

There was no traffic in the streets that my mother took with a videophone, and there was no liveliness in Veronica's memory.



To avoid being the target of her attacks, her mother lives at her home with the lights off during the day and evacuates to a shelter at a nearby school every time the siren sounds.

The mother was worried about the little children inside, saying, "In the shelter, I wear warm clothes, bring in blankets and sleeping bags, and sit curled up, but it's very cold."



Veronica said, "I'm in Japan right now, and I can't hold hands with her mother, and it's hard to support her with her warmth."



To help her even a little, Veronica continues to collect the explosions and military situations that occurred in the surrounding area on SNS and send them to her mother.



Her father, Oleg (55), is usually a truck driver abroad to work, but he returned to Ukraine on the 2nd due to the worsening war situation and is thinking of joining the military in the future. That is.



"My dad has a strong desire to protect his home and family, but of course, as her daughter, she doesn't want her to go to war," she said.

Veronica, who continues to worry that "this may be the last call" every time she contacts her family, is frustrated as the ceasefire talks between Russia and Ukraine are uncertain.



Veronica said, "Various people are negotiating, but if you don't decide as soon as possible, Ukrainians will die every day. Until now, no one really thought it was important to live a normal life. I think, when I realized that my life was gone, I realized that it was very important. Ukrainians love their country so much that they don't want to be another country, their culture and language. I want you to protect it. "