After nearly 1,000 days, Russia’s war against Ukraine is causing mental health issues for soldiers and civilians, including anxiety, panic attacks and PTSD. Ukraine’s Health Ministry estimates that 15 million people will need psychological support in the future.
In order to prevent Russian troops from advancing toward Kyiv, Ukrainian forces destroyed a dam on the Irpin River early on in the war. The flooding, as it turned out, created new wetland areas. Some conservationists hope to see the wetlands stay. Even residents whose cellars remain flooded are glad the water came and the Russian troops did not.
Ukraine is now considered the most heavily mined country in the world. Nearly 1,000 civilians have been killed or injured by landmines and unexploded ordnances since the beginning of the full-scale Russian invasion in February 2022. And about a third of the country needs to be cleared of these explosives. Much of that land is farmland.
The Ukrainian government is doing an unusually thorough job of documenting environmental damages being caused by Russian attacks. Their primary goal, according to the Ministry of the Environment, is to eventually win compensation for these damages.
Denmark passed a special law last year that allows Ukrainians to bypass the asylum system and expedite the process of obtaining a two-year residency permit. But when the law expires in 2024, it remains unclear whether Denmark’s centrist government — with its overall, hard-line stance against immigration — will extend these temporary protections for Ukrainians.
Ukrainian authorities say at least 19,000 children have been transferred to Russia from occupied territories during the war. Some Ukrainian families have taken matters into their own hands, taking risky trips to Russia to try to bring their children back home.