As Russia continues pressing its attacks into Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy region, a special police unit known as the White Angels faces an increasingly daunting mission: Rescuing the last civilian holdouts from villages under heavy fire and getting them to safer regions.
The Ukrainian unit must watch for first-person view drones, land mines, and incoming glide bombs as they bounce along dirt roads to find sometimes reluctant villagers and persuade them to accept a ride to a distant emergency shelter.
Current Time’s Andriy Kuzakov joined the White Angels as they rolled through the back roads of the Sumy region. At one at one, they were forced to hide out under the cover of trees as Russian attack drones stalked overhead.
“There’s a first-person view drone,” Kuzakov said. “Police have come to a prearranged meeting point to pick people up for evacuation. A lot are flying. Meanwhile, we are hiding from them under the trees.”
Later, with the threat seemingly passed, the small crew rolled their white van into a settlement where they found a mother and her toddler daughter in urgent need of rescue.
White Angel officer Olena Stavytska, an experienced rescuer, distracted the child with games and sweets while getting the two into the van and on the road.
Stavytska said the day’s rescue numbers were relatively small.
“It varies,” she explained. “Sometimes 10, sometimes 15, sometimes 20. Many people. The situation in the Khotin area Is worse now. There are a lot of people.”
At another location, the White Angels came across Ivan Mykhaylovych, a single man in his 70s, who had been hearing incoming Russian shelling constantly.
“It happened every day,” he said. “There might have been a couple of calm hours during the night, but otherwise it was constant.”
When asked how many other civilian Ukrainians remain in his village, he answered, “I was the only one left in my area.”
One White Angels officer said a major challenge for the unit is persuading locals to leave their homes behind and head somewhere safer.
Many won’t agree to leave until their house or yard begin to take direct hits from Russian shelling.
The proximity of the front line does not seem enough to move most of them on its own.
“The border is about 10 kilometers away,” Kuzakov said, “and the front line is just 5 or 6 kilometers away.”
Blasts and the buzz of drones are constants for residents of this part of Sumy.
United Nations figures indicate that more than 13,000 Ukrainian civilians have been killed so far since the full-scale invasion began three years ago, a large portion of that from air strikes.
For locals in Sumy, making the decision to leave their homes behind, even with the assistance of the White Angels, is still vexing.
The rescuers remain on patrol for those who choose to evacuate while there’s still time.
