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Demo in Kyiv: Every Sunday Alisa Chumak stands here with her two-year-old son Tymofii. Like other families, they are demanding the release of a family member from Russian captivity.

Tymofii's father, Denys Chumak, was captured by Russian troops in Mariupol in May 2022. The Reuters news agency visited his family in Kyiv.

Alisa Chumak, mother:


»He recognizes his father Denys in photos. When I ask him where his father is, he simply points to a photo. The last time Tymofii saw his father he was eight months old. Now he's two years and six months old and his father is just a photo."

Denys Chumak is a member of the Ukrainian National Guard. He is one of the fighters who defended the “Azov Steel Plant” in Mariupol until May 2022.

The port city in the southeast of the country was an important industrial location in Ukraine until the Russian invasion. After the siege by Putin's troops, there is hardly anything left of Mariupol. According to Ukrainian information, Russia is said to have captured at least 3,500 people here alone.

Among them was Denys Chumak. Alisa says she last saw her husband in the summer of 2023 on a Russian Telegram channel. The 25-year-old can still remember the day she said goodbye to her husband.

Alisa Chumak, mother

:


»I can still see the scene. It reminds me of bad war films I once watched. That day he gave me some diapers, some food, and some batteries so we could turn on the lights in the basement. He didn't even have time to hug me. He gave me everything, turned around, said he loved us and that was it. I saw him get into the car and that was it. That was the last time we saw each other.”

Thousands of Ukrainians are in Russian captivity. So far, prisoners from Russia and Ukraine have been exchanged around 50 times. Around 3,000 people are said to have been released in this way.

Alisa Chumak, mother

:


»I'm about to start crying again... The hardest thing for me is seeing our child grow up without a father. He lacks male attention. He is very lonely. He just reacts differently to men than he does to women.”

With the demonstrations, Alisa Chumak and her colleagues want to keep the memory of her family members alive - in the hope that they too will be released at some point.