1.
Above: A bombed building in Kyiv It’s hard to think of two more different settings than peaceful Gowran and today’s war-torn Ukraine, but a brave local man has swapped one for the other, in recent days. Jim Harding has travelled from Kilkenny to Kyiv, bringing with him four wheel drive vehicles and medical aid for the people of Ukraine. Amid air-raid warning sirens, and surrounded by bullet-riddled buildings and vehicles, Jim sends home pictures and videos from a country, and people, he has come to love. The pictures alone are heartbreaking, but also starkly show the daily reality for people in Ukraine, continuing 15 months after their homeland was invaded. Back home in Gowran, children are looking forward to summer holidays, playing with friends, summer camps. In Kyiv Jim visits what, from the distance, looks like a pile of rusty, old vehicles. But he explains these vehicles were destroyed in the battle for Irpin bridge, where the Russian assault was stopped before it reached Kyiv. If you look closely, some of the rusty heaps contain contrasting cuddly toys and colourful dolls - they were placed in the cars where children died. ABOVE: A pile of burned out cars following the battle for Irpin Bridge. BELOW: Toys are placed in the remains of war damaged cars in which children died. One of the videos Jim sent home, last week, showed school children running to a bomb shelter, their frightened cries mingling with the background warning siren. Another video shows Jim walking through a building beside Irpin bridge - the walls pockmarked by missiles and the roof broken apart with craters. He saw roads north of Kyiv that are “totally cut up” from all the armoured vehicles that have travelled them. He described how the bad condition meant “a lot of very slow driving with a lot of manoeuvring to avoid huge holes in the road, which remain irreparable in case of another assault from this direction. “Anyone travelling the main roads to Lviv, Kyiv etc would think this was a very prosperous country, but a
2.
Above: A bombed building in Kyiv It’s hard to think of two more different settings than peaceful Gowran and today’s war-torn Ukraine, but a brave local man has swapped one for the other, in recent days. Jim Harding has travelled from Kilkenny to Kyiv, bringing with him four wheel drive vehicles and medical aid for the people of Ukraine. Amid air-raid warning sirens, and surrounded by bullet-riddled buildings and vehicles, Jim sends home pictures and videos from a country, and people, he has come to love. The pictures alone are heartbreaking, but also starkly show the daily reality for people in Ukraine, continuing 15 months after their homeland was invaded. Back home in Gowran, children are looking forward to summer holidays, playing with friends, summer camps. In Kyiv Jim visits what, from the distance, looks like a pile of rusty, old vehicles. But he explains these vehicles were destroyed in the battle for Irpin bridge, where the Russian assault was stopped before it reached Kyiv. If you look closely, some of the rusty heaps contain contrasting cuddly toys and colourful dolls - they were placed in the cars where children died. ABOVE: A pile of burned out cars following the battle for Irpin Bridge. BELOW: Toys are placed in the remains of war damaged cars in which children died. One of the videos Jim sent home, last week, showed school children running to a bomb shelter, their frightened cries mingling with the background warning siren. Another video shows Jim walking through a building beside Irpin bridge - the walls pockmarked by missiles and the roof broken apart with craters. He saw roads north of Kyiv that are “totally cut up” from all the armoured vehicles that have travelled them. He described how the bad condition meant “a lot of very slow driving with a lot of manoeuvring to avoid huge holes in the road, which remain irreparable in case of another assault from this direction. “Anyone travelling the main roads to Lviv, Kyiv etc would think this was a very prosperous country, but a
3.
Kyiv city “is fabulous and seems vibrant with large volumes of people, as you would expect in any modern capital,” Jim said. Jim’s mission began earlier this year, when he first travelled to Ukraine with a Tipperary-based aid convoy. When he returned to Kilkenny he told the Kilkenny People: “I couldn’t come back here, having seen what they are going through, the battles they are fighting, the friends they are losing, and do absolutely nothing. “Ireland as a country may be neutral but the Irish people cannot stand back and see this nation, which shares a background eerily similar to our own in terms of famine colonisation and character, defend their country against the world’s second largest military machine without doing everything in our power to help.” Jim’s way to help was to appeal for vehicles and medical aid. On this trip his group have taken a large amount of medical aid, which has been handed over to a disability charity in Kyiv for onward distribution. Those defending Ukraine also badly want four-wheel vans and ambulances, Jim said. The need for ambulances is self explanatory, he said, and is central to his aim of saving lives. Four-wheel drive vehicles are needed to bring people to and from frontline areas. They will bring injured people away from the front and to ambulances and treatment centres. Ambulances are kept back from the frontlines because they can’t afford to lose them.
4.
Kyiv city “is fabulous and seems vibrant with large volumes of people, as you would expect in any modern capital,” Jim said. Jim’s mission began earlier this year, when he first travelled to Ukraine with a Tipperary-based aid convoy. When he returned to Kilkenny he told the Kilkenny People: “I couldn’t come back here, having seen what they are going through, the battles they are fighting, the friends they are losing, and do absolutely nothing. “Ireland as a country may be neutral but the Irish people cannot stand back and see this nation, which shares a background eerily similar to our own in terms of famine colonisation and character, defend their country against the world’s second largest military machine without doing everything in our power to help.” Jim’s way to help was to appeal for vehicles and medical aid. On this trip his group have taken a large amount of medical aid, which has been handed over to a disability charity in Kyiv for onward distribution. Those defending Ukraine also badly want four-wheel vans and ambulances, Jim said. The need for ambulances is self explanatory, he said, and is central to his aim of saving lives. Four-wheel drive vehicles are needed to bring people to and from frontline areas. They will bring injured people away from the front and to ambulances and treatment centres. Ambulances are kept back from the frontlines because they can’t afford to lose them.