Ukraine buries its fallen soldiers at Bezliudivka cemetery

At Kharkiv’s cemetery N°18, a sea of Ukrainian flags marks the graves of the fallen.

For some years, the cemetery at Bezliudivka, on the outskirts of Ukraine’s second city, has maintained a military sector.

Since the Russian incursion three months ago, it has been burying Ukrainian troops. More troops were put to rest beside their colleagues on Saturday.

Sergiy Profotilov, born in 1976, and Igor Malenkov, born in 1985, had coffins arranged on trestles. Both were slain at Vilkhivka, which is located east of Kharkiv.

Their gravestones bore the official date of their deaths, which was 11 May. But it was most likely when their remains were retrieved from the settlement, which had been the site of severe fighting before it was liberated over a month ago.

“They were found with five other bodies that we couldn’t identify,”

said one soldier, who spoke on condition he was not identified.

“We suspect they were executed,” “They were killed by bullets to the back of the head.”

he added.

HALF A DOZEN SOLDIERS

Only half a dozen soldiers and the brother of one of the dead were present for the ceremony, which lasted about an hour.

The military chaplain recited the prayers and sprinkled incense on the coffins under the grey sky, against a background of Russian and Ukrainian artillery fire just a few kilometres away.

The mourners laid red carnations on the graves. Then, after a brief exchange of greetings and embraces, they went their separate ways.

The brother walked alone down a line of dozens of graves, the death certificate in his hand.

A line of flags FOR THE FALLEN SOLDIERS

Two pick-up trucks arrived carrying soldiers from Ukraine’s foreign legion. About a dozen of them have come to pay a final homage to one of their comrades, a Dutch soldier killed by artillery fire.

It was forbidden to film the ceremony or to identify the fallen fighter.

Here, there was no religious ceremony, but a brief speech in English given by an officer. One soldier, with a British flag on his vest gave a military salute. Another touched the cross before leaving.

At a fifth ceremony, the family of 47-year-old Olexandr Gaponchev were mourning his death at Tsyrkuny, north of Kharkiv. Many of those present in tears.

And a few minutes later, the fifth funeral of the day started.

The mother of the fallen soldier, wept inconsolably over her son’s coffin, held up by members of her family, as the rain began to fall.

Another woman, probably his wife, was also weeping.

Then the coffin was lowered into the ground, each mourner threw a fistful of earth into the grave before the cemetery workers filled it in and planted a wooden cross with the name of the dead soldiers.

Behind that grave, a line of Ukrainian flags flapped in the wind, one for each grave.

© Agence France-Presse