At a bar in a once-occupied Ukrainian village, dehumanizing messages on the walls were a stark reminder that the Kremlin wants to stamp out Ukraine and its culture.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine last year, the war has been defined by moments of happenstance and terror: Mere minutes or yards sometimes dictate who lives or dies, from front-line battlefields to Ukraine’s dense cities and Russia’s border regions, where some authorities have recently described Ukrainian shelling and announced evacuations.
Andrei Medvedev fought with Russia’s Wagner mercenaries in Ukraine, then requested asylum in Norway. The authorities there must now weigh his plea against solidarity with Ukraine.
The twists and turns of a war are rarely easy to predict. In Ukraine, they landed on a city in the east that few had ever heard of. And then the whole world watched for months.