Sumy, a middle of Ukrainian tradition, lives within the crosshairs of a brand new Russian offensive

SUMY, Ukraine — That horrible Sunday retains replaying in Natalia Tsybulko’s head. The large explosions. The frantic calls to seek out her daughter. The phrases from her son-in-law that shattered her life.

“‘Mom, Olena is no longer with us’,” Tsybulko recalled him saying when he known as, his voice ragged. “He was holding her body in his arms.”

Olena Kohut, her 46-year-old daughter, was killed in a Russian missile assault right here in April. She was the organist of the native philharmonic and one thing of a celeb in Sumy, a northern Ukrainian regional capital with a historical past of music and resistance, about 15 miles from the Russian border.

“You think you’ve been hardened by this war, it’s been going on so long,” Tsybulko says. “And then it takes the very light of your life.”

Like many Ukrainian cities, Sumy has been scarred by warfare. It noticed heavy preventing early within the full-scale invasion and has, within the final yr, change into a frequent goal of Russian drones, missiles and guided bombs. Now, Ukraine’s prime basic, Oleksandr Syrsky, says at the very least 50,000 Russian troops have massed on the opposite aspect of the border, although Ukraine has to this point managed to thwart them.

“You’re alive!”

Sumy sits on the banks of the Psel River, and even now, regardless of common assaults, locals fill the leafy riverside promenade when the climate is heat and sunny. They used to flock to music festivals on Bach and brass bands earlier than the warfare. When Russia launched its full-scale invasion, a lot of Sumy’s authorities fled, and residents defended the town on their very own.

“We are friendly but tough,” mentioned performing mayor Artem Kobzar. “We don’t back down.”

Within the final yr, Kobzar mentioned, the town of Sumy has change into a magnet for individuals who dwell in larger Sumy — villages on the Russian border, the place assaults are extra frequent. Newspaper writer Natalia Kalinichenko is from Biliopillia, a village within the area lower than 4 miles from the Russian border. Kalinichenko now lives part-time in Sumy, although the newspaper she runs remains to be delivered to these remaining within the village.

“In many villages along the border, there is often no electricity or internet,” she mentioned. “And the printed copy of a newspaper is often the only source of information for people.”

The area of Sumy borders Russia’s Kursk area. Final summer season, Ukraine launched a shock incursion into Kursk. The operation was meant to distract Russia and pull Russian troops from weak sections of the jap frontline. As Russian troops slowly clawed again most of Kursk, assaults on Sumy – and its regional capital, Sumy metropolis – elevated.

In a single assault in late January, Russian drones hit an condo complicated in an in a single day assault, killing 9 folks and injuring 13. Smoke and dirt crammed the air as shocked residents ran out of the damaged constructing, bundling their cats and canine inside their coats and bathrobes, and calling their neighbors.

“You’re alive!” one lady screamed in aid into her cellphone.

Anton Svachko, a member of Ukraine’s parliament from the town, drove to the scene instantly after he heard the information.

“We need more air defense, we need more air defense units, we need more everything,” he instructed NPR, rubbing his eyes as he surveyed the injury.

Standing subsequent to him was the performing mayor, Kobzar, who comforted two siblings who could not discover their family and a household whose house was destroyed.

“The people whose homes have been struck, the first thing they ask me is, ‘how quickly can my home be rebuilt?'” Kobzar mentioned.

Volodymyr Silvanovskyi, a 63-year-old customs official, shook his head after he came upon his neighbors, a pair of their 60s, had been killed, crushed inside their very own condo. As he ran out, he noticed their whole condo had caved in.

“We stay because we don’t have anywhere to go,” he mentioned, his voice breaking. “We have poured our lives into these homes.”

On the time of the strike, President Trump had not too long ago been inaugurated, and Valentina Taran, a 65-year-old retiree who lived within the condo complicated, was hopeful. She had grown disillusioned with the Biden administration’s method to Ukraine, which she described as “helping us just enough to survive but not much more.” She mentioned she anticipated Trump to be extra decisive.

“I just wish he could stop this war,” she mentioned, “but I don’t know if he knows how.”

An ally turns

The morning after the strikes, the newsroom of Cukr, a neighborhood on-line journal targeted on group information, was buzzing.

The identify comes from a shortened model of the Ukrainian phrase for sugar. “The city was once a main producer of sugar,” mentioned Dmytro Tyshchenko, the outlet’s editor. “That was a long time ago, but we like the name.”

Cukr tries to give attention to upbeat information, Tyshchenko mentioned, including that “we want to encourage people to take pride in our city.” The frequent Russian assaults, nevertheless, are sometimes on the entrance web page. When NPR visited the newsroom earlier this yr, the assault was the primary information on Cukr’s homepage, together with a trending profile a few lady who makes socks for Ukraine’s navy.

“We are here to challenge Russian propaganda and the constant depressive situation of war,” Tyshchenko mentioned, as we walked into the newsroom. “We live in this city and we want people to know it, and to know each other.”

Inside, communications supervisor Anna Olshanska was pacing. The strike hit the neighborhood the place she grew up.

“My parents live there, and they’re OK, thank God,” she mentioned. “It was a very stressful morning.”

The morning was additionally tense for one more motive: The Trump administration had frozen U.S. Company for Worldwide Growth funds, together with cash that helped assist Ukraine’s unbiased media. Till then, Cukr obtained 60% of its cash from USAID, in line with Tyshchenko.

“It’s hitting small media like us the worst,” he mentioned. “We don’t have time to worry about it. We are trying to be optimistic about surviving without this help.”

Russian assaults in Sumy continued as Ukraine instantly confronted an unreliable relationship with the U.S., as soon as its strongest particular person ally.

The Trump administration started dismantling USAID, an enormous blow to Ukraine, the company’s prime recipient as of 2023, the final yr by which knowledge is offered. Company funds did far more than subsidize unbiased media. The cash supported Ukraine’s farmers, veterans and tech employees, and in addition helped the nation restore its power grid, badly broken by Russian assaults.

Trump and his prime aides additionally berated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy when he visited the Oval Workplace on Feb. 28 and repeated Russian speaking factors. After that, the White Home abruptly lower off navy help to Ukraine, in addition to intelligence sharing. The help cut-off lasted a few week, till talks between Ukraine and the U.S. in Saudi Arabia on March 11, when Ukraine agreed unconditionally to a U.S.-brokered ceasefire to final 30 days.

Russia didn’t signal on, nevertheless, and after that started escalating assaults on Ukrainian cities.

A bloody Sunday

On April 13, Palm Sunday, 13-year-old Kyrylo Illiashenko was on a bus in downtown Sumy along with his mother, Maryna. They have been headed to his grandmother’s home and after that he had wrestling apply.

He held his gymnasium bag on his lap as his mother talked on the telephone to his grandmother about Sunday lunch. Then the boy heard an odd whistling sound.

“And then an explosion,” he mentioned. “I was knocked down and felt broken glass cutting me.” The glass shards additionally sliced his mom’s face. The bus stuffed with black smoke.

A Russian ballistic missile had hit close by. Individuals on the bus shouted for the motive force to open the door.

“But the driver was dead,” Kyrylo mentioned.

He could not discover his mother and apprehensive the bus would explode. A damaged window was the one exit. He hurled his gymnasium bag via the window, then jumped via himself.

Outdoors, he noticed our bodies on the road. He rushed again to the bus and compelled the door open. He pulled out the gasping passengers, together with his mother. Later, his eighth-grade classmates thanked him for saving their family on that bus.

“You’re a hero,” they texted him.

Nadia Hryn, who runs Sumy’s music conservatory, heard the city’s philharmonic constructing had additionally been hit. She knew her pal Olena Kohut, the philharmonic’s organ soloist, was on her technique to rehearsal there. Kohut additionally taught piano on the conservatory.

“I heard the first explosion and called Olena right away,” Hryn mentioned. “She didn’t answer.”

Kohut’s greatest pal, Ella Mykhaylova, a violinist, known as her too, a number of instances, however could not get via. Then she bought a name from the philharmonic’s percussionist.

“He told me she had called him after the first explosion and said there were many people lying on the street,” Mykhaylova mentioned. “She wanted to help them. Then there was a second explosion, so he ran to find her.”

A second ballistic missile had hit, just some minutes after the primary. He discovered her on the bottom, not shifting. Emergency employees tried to resuscitate her for an hour earlier than giving up.

She was amongst 35 folks killed that day. Greater than 100 have been injured.

Kohut’s college students left bouquets wrapped in sheet music on the web site of the assaults.

The grieving mom

Kohut’s mom, Natalia Tsybulko, is a classically skilled singer who additionally teaches on the conservatory. She has returned to the classroom alone. Her daughter’s absence haunts her.

“When she was a baby, I took her to all my concerts,” Tsybulko mentioned. “When she grew up and fell in love with the piano, she accompanied me when I sang.”

As she listened to a scholar sing Italian arias – her daughter’s favourite – she struggled to compose herself. After class, Tsybulko sat within the again, scrolling via her telephone to seek out movies of her daughter’s organ performances.

“When she sat down to play that organ, she made it sing like a voice,” Tsybulko mentioned, her voice hoarse.

She wiped away tears and walked upstairs to satisfy Hryn, the conservatory director. In her workplace, Hryn set out cups of espresso spiced with pepper, cardamom and some drops of robust Slovak liquor. She sat subsequent to the grieving mom and stroked her hand.

“The horror and cruelty, we feel it every day,” Hryn mentioned. “We tell each other, ‘have a safe day, a safe night, a quiet night’. And then we go to funerals. Everything is fragile.”

Kohut’s household and associates held a memorial live performance for her on Could 21 in a candlelit corridor. The live performance opened with a billboard-size display screen displaying a video of Kohut in a black, glittery full-length robe, enjoying “Chariots of Fire” by Vangelis. A efficiency by Kohut’s college students and the philharmonic orchestra adopted.

“She flew her short life,” mentioned Hryn, “on the wings of music.”