(Lviv) “My sun, baby, we will win,” cried a woman caressing a wooden coffin in central Lviv, western Ukraine. His son, an explosives expert, was killed in a Russian bombing near Mariupol in the south of the country.
Posted at 9:44 AM
“His name is Vasil Vishevani, he was 28 years old,” the father told AFP as he stood in front of the open bell door where six young soldiers laid the coffin covered with flowers on a trellis.
He said his son was excavating the area around the bridge to prevent the Russians from advancing when Grad rockets landed on the site, killing him instantly.
“There are no bodies there, only shrapnel,” said the old man, whose eldest son is also an officer in the Ukrainian army stationed near the Belarusian border in northern Ukraine.
Many funeral processions prepare to depart for the tombs from the Peter and Paul Garrison Church, the imposing 17th-century Baroque building where religious services for three Ukrainian soldiers killed in the fighting with Russia have just been celebrated.
Inside the church, under the eye of the marble statues, dozens of soldiers and civilians attended the ceremony. Several young women in camouflage, wearing a red hat, hold bouquets of flowers in their hands.
On top of the three enclosed coffins, contrary to tradition, stand six young soldiers, faces in marble, raising a guard of honor, carrying large wooden crosses and a yellow and blue national flag.
Next to Vasyl, there is Lieutenant Dmytro Kotenko, 20, and Private Kirilu Moroz, 25.
Dressed in a red and gold robe, a Greek Catholic priest, the dominant denomination in western Ukraine, waves his incense burner, which releases a little smoke and smells of incense. His colleague, holding the bottle in his hand, then sprinkles the coffins with holy water.
“Defenders in the Air”
Next to her, a monk in a black robe recites a prayer: “We accompany them on their last journey, it is a journey to heaven where they will continue to defend us,” he says.
“We must thank the fathers of those heroes who joined the mass of our defenders in Heaven.”
A white handkerchief in her trembling hand, Vasil’s mother sways and a relative supports her by the arm.
“Glory to God, glory to Ukraine,” concludes the priest.
The three coffins carried by the soldiers floated toward the exit to be greeted outside by three military musicians playing a sad, pocket melody.
A face puffy with tears, a young woman with long hair, a black cloth headband on her head as a sign of mourning, presses the image of a young soldier to her chest.
Why do they take good people from us, why do they take our children? Vasyl’s mother mourns, who will bury her son in a small town near Lviv.
At the historic Lychakiv cemetery, in Lviv, a salute of honor rings in honor of his two comrades under the warm winter sun.
Hand in hand, their colleagues are finally applauding them on the sound of the national anthem.
Slowly, the coffins were buried alongside many other modern tombs in this military part of the cemetery. In front of that soldier Dmytro Kotenko, a young soldier meditates before leaving and wipes the tears from his face.
