WATCH: Small Group of Ukrainians Gather to Kneel, Pray as Russia Bombs the Country
By Movieguide® Staff
CNN captured an emotional moment of a small group of people kneeling and praying in a Ukrainian town square as Russia attacked the country.
“I think this really speaks to the the sort of desperation of this moment. We just see a small group of people and I’m hoping you can see them on our shot here,” CNN correspondent Clarissa Ward said on the air. “A small group of people have gathered in the main square and they are kneeling and praying. Because right now there is truly a sense of having no idea what is coming down the pipeline. What is in store for the people of Ukraine in the coming hours in the coming days, and it’s freezing cold here. So to see these people kneeling on the cold stone, and prayer is honestly it’s very moving gone. And I think it speaks to the state of ordinary Ukrainians here who have done absolutely nothing to deserve this who have no quarrel with Russia.”
What a moment captured by @clarissaward and her team in Kharkiv.
“A small group of people have gathered in the main square and they are kneeling and praying,” Clarissa says. “Because right now there is truly a sense of having no idea what is coming down the pipeline.” pic.twitter.com/cAoLi8Euaq— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) February 24, 2022
Ward was on the ground as Russia attacked its eastern neighbors overnight.
According to BBC:
In a televised speech at 05:55 Moscow time (02:55 GMT), Mr Putin announced a “military operation” in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region. This area is home to many Russian-speaking Ukrainians. Parts of it has been occupied and run by Russian-backed rebels since 2014.
Mr Putin said Russia was intervening as an act of self-defence. Russia did not want to occupy Ukraine, he said, but would demilitarise and “de-Nazify” the country.
He urged Ukrainian soldiers in the combat zone to lay down their weapons and go home, but said clashes were inevitable and “only a question of time”.
And he added that any intervention from outside powers to resist the Russian attack would be met with an “instant” and devastating response. …
BBC correspondents heard loud bangs in the capital Kyiv, as well as Kramatorsk in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine. Blasts have also been heard in the southern port city of Odesa.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia had carried out missile strikes on Ukraine’s infrastructure and on border guards.
Russia’s defence ministry has denied attacking Ukrainian cities – saying it was targeting military infrastructure, air defence and air forces with “high-precision weapons”.
Tanks and troops have poured into Ukraine at points along its eastern, southern and northern borders, Ukraine says.
Russian military convoys have crossed from Belarus into Ukraine’s northern Chernihiv region, and from Russia into the Sumy region, which is also in the north, Ukraine’s border guard service (DPSU) said.
Belarus is a long-time ally of Russia. Analysts describe the small country as Russia’s “client state”.
Celebrities from both nations have spoken out against the violence.
According to the Moscow Times:
“Soviet crimes went unpunished in Russia, and so they recur. The price for what was not done in 1991 are the Russian missiles and bombs killing Ukrainians today,” Sergei Lebedev, author of “Untraceable,” wrote under a photograph of the Bykivnia graves outside Kyiv where “enemies of the people” executed by the NKVD were buried.
“It is too early to ask Ukrainians to forgive us,” he wrote. “We will ask for forgiveness after the criminals who began this war are punished. If they are punished.”
Yelena Kovalskaya, director of the Meyerhold Theater Center, announced her resignation from the state theater Thursday, saying: “It is impossible to work for a murderer and receive salary from him. I will finish the work I’ve started, but without pay.”
The police-monitoring website OVD-Info reported dozens of detentions in Moscow, St. Petersburg and other Russian cities for staging solo pickets against the war.
Activist Marina Litvinovich called on Russians to attend a “walk” against the war at 7 p.m. Moscow time, including on Pushkin Square in central Moscow.
Soon after, authorities detained Litvinovich outside her home, the independent broadcaster Dozhd reported.
DANCING WITH THE STARS Maks Chmerkovskiy posted several videos to his Instagram account live from Ukraine.
“I’m in Kyiv, contrary to what I probably should’ve done a while ago … and not that no one saw this coming, but everybody was hoping that the finality of this situation would be averted, that there wasn’t going to be these kind of aggressive measures,” Chmerkovskiy said.
“In 2022’s civilized world, this is not the way we do things,” he said as he prepared to go down to a bomb shelter. “I think the Russians need to get up and actually say something, because no one’s opinion is being heard. This is all one man’s ambition of something, and however convenient it sounds in Moscow, however comfortable you are where you are in Russia, I just don’t think this is the right thing.”
Former BAYWATCH star Erika Eleniak, who also first appeared in E.T., is originally from Ukraine and spoke out against the violence.
“I am stunned. I am sad and I am sickened by the attack on Ukraine and the Ukranian people,” Eleniak told Fox News. “I have no words for the level of diabolical behavior that is being committed but I am praying that the world will rise up in support of the Ukrainian people and for ALL the people who are affected by this attack.”
Evangelist Franklin Graham called for prayer.
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