Three years of war in Ukraine: Fear of washing machine noise
Azad is actually a foreman on a construction site. But there is no construction during a war, at least not in Kharkiv, he complains. That's why he earns his living driving a taxi. Azad is an Azerbaijani citizen. But he has lived in Ukraine for 30 years, and married his Ukrainian wife 20 years ago. In the 1990s, his family lost their house near Nagorno-Karabakh in the Armenian-Azerbaijani war. They had to flee, he says, and decided to look for a quieter place to live - in Ukraine.
A good two years ago, his parents' house was shot to pieces and his parents fled again. "They went back to Azerbaijan, there is no war there." He himself will stay. He even jumps when he hears the washing machine in the apartment next door at night because he thinks it could be a flying object. Anyone who can sleep through the night in Kharkiv is a lucky person.
Last weekend, Ihor Terekhov, the mayor of Kharkiv, proudly announced that a siren warning system had been set up. It distinguishes between threats to the Kharkiv region and the city of Kharkiv. As a result, the traumatized population will hear the alarm signals less often.
Azad is not really happy about this. Until now, he had always convinced himself that the sirens were related to the area and not to the city of Kharkiv. Now, unfortunately, he is certain that every alarm poses an acute danger to his city of Kharkiv. The hopes that things would calm down on the third anniversary of the Russian attack on Ukraine have not been fulfilled.
The hopes that things would calm down on the third anniversary of the Russian attack on Ukraine have not been fulfilled. According to Ukrainian authorities, Ukraine was attacked by 185 drones during the night of Monday alone. And even during the day on the anniversary, the sirens can be heard several times in Kharkiv.
While some channels offer special programs, discussions about scenarios of the end of the war, documentaries and reports, others largely maintain their regular programs. After all, they argue, every day in the war is more or less the same.
The channel "1+1" is dedicated to the fate of Ukrainians at home and abroad, with live broadcasts from Irpin and Bucha. "Inter" shows how Ukraine has changed as a result of the war - from the military to the use of language in society. The channel of the Ukrainian parliament "Rada" is making a special program about volunteers.
The public broadcaster "Suspilne" describes the fate of a girl who lost her mother in the attack on the train station in Kramatorsk. In addition, "Rada" analyses the population development in Ukraine since the invasion and the social changes due to an increasing number of people with disabilities.
According to Yevhen Sakharov, chairman of the Kharkiv Human Rights Group, Ukraine has now registered 63,000 missing people - men, women and children who disappeared during the war. No one knows where they are, Sakharov said.
He also demands that all Ukrainian prisoners of war and all detained persons be released and exchanged before negotiations begin . The same should apply to Russian prisoners who have been convicted for protesting against the war.
taz
