Ukraine: Russian bombing turns Irpin, on the outskirts of Kiev, into a ghost town

Irpin was a wealthy suburb of Kiev, the Ukrainian capital, but most of its inhabitants have fled Russian bombing and it is now a ghost town.

The streets are littered with debris from Grad missiles that blew up both high-rise apartment buildings and modest brick and wood bungalows.

Sometimes the empty streets are so quiet that the sound of a woodpecker hitting a tree is louder than the distant canyons.

But other times there is the rumble of Grad missile batteries and mortar rounds being fired nearby.

It’s so much more than Mykola Pustovit, a 69-year-old man, could stand. When he and his wife set out on a long walk to seek relative safety in Kiev, he breaks down in tears.

They were hoping that the front line would move away from Irpin, “But now, after so many bombings, it is unbearable.”

Actually, the front line hasn’t moved for days. According to the calculations of the Ukrainian soldiers at the checkpoints in the city, between 20% and 30% of the district is in Russian hands.

The next suburb, Bucha, a few hundred meters further north, is already in the hands of the invading army.

Violence is never far away. As AFP reporters crossed a makeshift wooden bridge into Irpin early on Sunday, Ukrainian forces were removing the bodies of three of their comrades.

Later, a car carrying American journalists was fired upon near a Ukrainian checkpoint, killing the photographer. Brent Renaud and wounding reporter Juan Arredondo.

After the incident, the mayor of Irpin, Oleksandr Markushynbarred reporters from entering the city but before the ban went into effect, AFP was able to speak to some civilians who were unwilling to leave.

“This one bites”

It is the case of Iryna Morozovawho raises her hands in fright in surrender when the AFP journalists approach, as if they were pointing a gun at her.

His house is badly damaged, and the one next door was practically destroyed, apparently by a missile hit.

But this 54-year-old woman says she can’t leave because who will feed her dogs?

He has the keys to a neighbor’s house where three puppies, a Golden Retriever and a German shepherd are now locked up.

“This one bites, we lock him in the cage. When we found him he was scared and trembling”, it says. The other dogs have a garden and play happily with visitors.

“They sleep in the kitchen. They play during the day. How can you leave them? Morozova wonders.

The few remaining neighbors help each other and bring food to the elderly, but Iryna Morozova is more concerned about pets.

“There is nothing left here”he says in front of a ruined house. “Now we collect stray animals and feed them, because people abandoned them and left.”

After years working as a train conductor in Dushanbe, the capital of Tajikistan, Vera Tyskanova76, had retired on what was until recently a quiet street in a pleasant suburb.

But now, since an air raid in the early days of the war, which began late last month, he lives without electricity and consoles himself by feeding stray dogs in the neighbourhood.

“There is water, but there is no electricity. There is a chimney in the part of the house that is not ruined (…) I am surviving”he says laughing.

Around the corner your neighbor Mykola Karpovych84, who was a tractor driver on farmland near the then-friendly border with Belarus, is puzzled.

“Where am I going to go? My legs and hands hurt.”he tells AFP. “Go away? Where would she go? Go to Kyiv? I will not go anywhere. What happens, happens. I am too old”.

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