A children’s hospital in Mariupol after a Russian airstrike. Image by АрміяInform. CC BY 4.0
The Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine has now lasted 1462 days. That’s 48 months, or four years. As of February 24, 2026, this is already 44 days longer than the Second World War (Eastern Front) lasted for the Soviet Union. People in Ukraine live under constant shelling, they are freezing in their houses without electricity and heat, because Russia has bombed civilians and destroyed civil infrastructure practically every day of this war. Ukrainians are separated from their families and friends; many have lost not only their homes but also their home towns that were bombed to the ground.
This war so far has brought hundreds of thousands of military casualties and tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilian deaths. As of February 2026, Russian forces occupy about 20 percent of Ukraine. Out of a prewar population of 41 million, around 8 million Ukrainians have been displaced within Ukraine, and around 7 million have became refugees.
Today, NGOs the Help Desk Media, Memorial, Kronika, and Zimin Foundation published online an archive of testimonials by the eyewitnesses to the Russian invasion gathered during the period 2022 –2024. The testimonials were previously published on Help Desk’s Instagram page but the archive could not depend on a platform. Now it is available at online with descriptions and monologues in Ukrainian, Russian and English.
Here are links to some of the stories.
Oleksandr: I kept bragging to all my friends in my dreams: “See, Ira is alive.” A resident of Dnipro lost his wife in an apartment building strike. His story continues two years later.
Maria: “I was told to my face that we invited Russia ourselves, that it’s our own fault.” A resident of Sievierodonetsk on evacuation through Russia and Poland to Germany
Tetiana and Zauri: “Our house in Kherson still stands — that gives us strength. The house in Abkhazia — nothing’s left but the foundation.” The story of a Ukrainian woman and a Georgian man who 30 years ago fled the war Abkhazia and now flee the war in Ukraine.
Explore the website and see the archive of testimonies recorded there.
