Days after the full-scale invasion started in Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Russians started occupying the outskirts of the Kyiv region. In March, 33 days after they arrived, they were forced to retreat. Navigating the previously occupied neighborhoods was uncertain. The scenes that were left in the liberated towns surrounding the capital depicted something more horrific than a war. It was an indisputable genocide.

Millions of refugees, mainly women and children crowded train stations as any male eligible began training for their deployment to defend their homeland. Air sirens rang across the country as rockets fell from the skies hitting infrastructure and taking innocent lives.

Behind the town Church of Saint Andrew the Apostle in Bucha, hundreds of bodies were pulled from a mass grave while more were extracted from the rubble of destroyed buildings and homes. Mothers wept at the funerals of their sons multiple times a day. For the first time, the world bore witness to the horrific death and destruction happening behind enemy lines in Ukraine.

Now after over a year of fierce fighting on the frontlines, Ukrainians are adjusting to a new normal of daily survival in a warzone. The continued documentation of the stories in Ukraine is pivotal to this historical defense of democracy,