Valery Melnikov

Photographer/Videographer/Visual Storyteller
    
Black Days of Ukraine
Projects (6)
Public Project
Black Days of Ukraine
Copyright Valery Melnikov 2024
Updated Jan 2022
Topics Conflict, Documentary, Donbass, Editorial, Essays, Human rights, Journalism, Personal Projects, Photography, Photojournalism, Ukraine, War
I arrived to the Ukrainian city of Luhansk in the early summer of 2014 and then it was still a peaceful town, but the feeling of an impending disaster was already in the air and and every following day it was getting stronger. The conflict between the separatists and the official Ukrainian authorities was gradually escalating into war. Full-scale hostilities were undertaken in the south-east of Ukraine. That summer became the bloodiest time for the strategically important Luhansk. The locals had to survive with no water and electricity under daily shelling. And each new day could become their last. In any war there are always at least two armed fighting sides. For me as a journalist and a human being, in that case the most important side was the third – that of the ordinary people, civilians, innocent victims of these conflicts. They never expected the disaster to enter their lives. The locals turned into military confrontation participants against their will. They experienced the most terrible things: their friends and relatives’ deaths, destroyed houses and ruined lives of thousands.
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Black Days of Ukraine by Valery Melnikov
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