CINCINNATI — On the one year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Cincinnatians plan to gather for a candlelight vigil in honor of the city's sister city, Kharkiv, which has been hit hard since the beginning of the invasion.
The vigil Friday night is intended to be "an opportunity to reflect and to remember our friends and colleagues in Kharkiv and throughout Ukraine," according to a press release. Many who lived in Kharkiv at the beginning of the invasion have been displaced, but many remain.
“I can sum up the last year in three words: Fear, love, hope,” Oleksandr Hranyk, a school director in Kharkiv, told the Associated Press.
Cedarville University senior Abigail Rist grew up in Ukraine, but became an American citizen when she started school at the university; the building where she once lived and the playground she once frequented as a child are now unfamiliar and destroyed.
Rist said as the second year of the war begins, she's concerned people around the world may forget what's still happening in Ukraine.
"We often times get together several times a week and just talk about some of our greatest fears, and one that we keep coming back to over and over again is people here don't understand that the people over there, the people who are fighting, the people who are dying, the people who are living through this are people, not just faces — and those people are our friends, our loved ones, the people who raised us," said Rist. "And that's a very heartbreaking thing to go through over here on this side."
The vigil, held at Presbyterian Church of Wyoming, is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. Ahead of the vigil, city officials and members of several Ukraine-supporting organizations gathered for a press release.
Speakers from the Cincinnati Kharkiv Sister City Partnership, Hope 4 Ukraine, Cincy 4 Ukraine joined Mayor Aftab Pureval, Congressman Greg Landsman and other city officials at the press conference.
Bob Herring, chair of the Cincinnati-Kharkiv Sister City Partnership, led the press conference and highlighted an important need for those in Kharkiv to feel supported by Cincinnati.
The sister city relationship, Herring said, is formed as a result of the signing of a memorandum of understanding, which formally happens every five years. The last time it was signed, Kharkiv officials traveled to Cincinnati to cement the cities relationship; in 2022, it was Cincinnati's turn to travel to Ukraine to renew the relationship, but because of Russia's invasion, this wasn't possible, Herring said.
People in Kharkiv do want to renew the bond, but making travel arrangements from Cincinnati has been problematic since then, Herring said.
"They feel a visit from Cincinnati to Kharkiv would...boost morale and let them know they're not forgotten," said Herring.
Since Russia first invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, an estimated 200,000 Russian troops have been either killed or wounded and tens of thousands of Ukranian civilians and soldiers have been killed. Millions throughout Ukraine have been displaced.
Ukraine’s leader pledged Friday to push for victory in 2023 as he and other Ukrainians marked the somber anniversary of the Russian invasion.
“We have been standing for exactly one year,” Zelenskyy said. Feb. 24, 2022, he said, was "the longest day of our lives. The hardest day of our modern history. We woke up early and haven’t fallen asleep since.”
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