KIEV, Ukraine (AP) — A somber atmosphere prevailed on Ukraine’s 33rd Independence Day on Saturday as the country attempted to Russia’s large-scale invasion reached a 30-month milestone. No fireworks, parades or concerts were planned, but instead Ukrainians marked the day with memorial services for civilians and soldiers killed in the war.
Ukrainians flooded social media with messages of gratitude and support, greeting each other and thanking the soldiers on the front lines. In the wave of unity, there is also a shared acknowledgement that the two and a half years have been hard and that exhaustion is mounting.
“Independence is the silence we experience when we lose our people,” President Volodymyr Zelensky told the nation. “Independence is going into the bunker during an air raid, just to hold out there and get up again and again, telling the enemy, ‘You will not achieve anything.'”
In central Kyiv, people marched in festive “vyshyvankas,” the traditional embroidered Ukrainian shirts. Some took photos with the blue and yellow national flag in front of an “I love Ukraine” sign near a makeshift memorial to the fallen soldiers.
Many people from the regions around Ukraine came to the capital for this occasion. Ukraine declared its independence from the Soviet Union on August 24, 1991.
“We can celebrate this holiday thanks to our soldiers – they are the reason for our lives,” said Oksana Stavnycha, who came to Kyiv from Vinnytsia with her seven-year-old daughter and her husband. They wanted to lay flowers to honor the fallen Ukrainian soldiers.
“The price of our independence is very high and every day many men give their lives for it.”
Zelensky pointed out that the war that Russia started on February 24, 2022, has now spread to its own territory.
“Those who try to sow evil on our land will reap the fruits on their own soil,” he said, referring to Ukraine’s incursion into Russia’s Kursk region earlier this month.
The President symbolically chose the northeastern city of Sumynear the Russian border, where Ukrainian forces entered Russia on August 6.
“913 days ago, Russia started its war against us, partly through the Sumy region,” Zelensky said. “They violated not only sovereign borders, but also the boundaries of cruelty and common sense, driven by an insatiable desire to destroy us.”
The surprise of Ukraine Invasion of the Russian region of Kurskgave the war a surprising twist, adding a new front to the conflict to counter Russia’s slow advance in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donetsk. Ukraine quickly captured significant swathes of Russian territory, including dozens of small towns, and captured hundreds of Russian soldiers – moves that could affect the course of the war.
“And those who tried to turn our country into a buffer zone should now worry about not turning their own country into a buffer federation,” Zelensky said. “This is how independence reacts.”
The Ukrainian military claims to hold 1,200 square kilometers of Russian territory in Kursk. Last week, it also launched drone strikes that hit strategic bridges as well as Russian airfields and drone bases.
Ukraine’s top military commander, General Oleksandr Syrskyi, honored the soldiers who fought in the Kursk region with military awards. “Our independence is in our blood,” he posted on Telegram on Saturday. “In the blood that flows in our veins, in the blood that our heroes shed for their homeland.”
But even if Ukraine continues its offensive against Russia, it is also Evacuation of residents from Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine, as Russian forces are now 10 kilometers away from the strategically important city.
Residents of Pokrovsk, a former town of 60,000, registered for evacuation at a central school on Friday and then, laden with bundles of their belongings, boarded trains that would take them to areas further away from the conflict zone.
Ihor Kysil, a 52-year-old soldier in the 110th Brigade, was wounded for the second time about a month ago in fighting in the Pokrovsk area. On Friday, still recovering from a concussion and a broken shoulder and struggling with hearing problems from a previous injury, he stood in Kyiv’s Independence Square holding his wife’s hand.
“This day is about our freedom,” he said as he stood next to the makeshift memorial to fallen soldiers, where thousands of flags flew in honor of those who lost their lives, including flags for comrades Kysil knew and served with.
“Every life is priceless,” added his wife Yuliia Fedenko. “We value every minute of our time.”
“These are the golden days,” said Kysil, knowing that after completing his rehabilitation he would return to the front.
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