I found my wife curled around our son — her last act was to shield him
When the doctors at Okhmatdyt children's hospital wake one young patient from his medically induced coma, he will discover he has lost his left eye to Russian shrapnel.
He will find his face, lacerated by the shards of a suicide drone, has been stitched back together and he will struggle to eat because of the pain caused by a hole in his tongue.
When he reaches out for his mother for comfort he will realise she has been taken from him for ever.
Mark Yefimenko, 4, and his mother, Anna, 27, are victims of Russia's biggest drone onslaught since the war began. Launched on Sunday, the day before President Trump's latest call to President Putin, at least 273 Russian long-range drones, mostly Iranian-designed Shaheds, hit
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Telegraph
26 minutes ago
- Telegraph
After the Brize Norton attack, Britain should be placed on a war footing
Many were astonished recently at Russia's inability to defend its military aircraft when Ukraine carried out drone strikes against them deep inside Russian territory. Well now the inadequacy of our own air base security has been exposed, although thankfully in a far less serious way. For now. RAF Brize Norton was attacked not by external forces but the enemy within. This was not a protest; it was a deliberate act of sabotage against military assets used to defend our country. What is shocking is that these saboteurs were able to access a highly defended base, put two air to air refuelling tankers out of action, and leave without being detected. That should not have happened at any time. But right now military bases should have been on a substantially heightened state of alert. Whether or not we are providing any assistance to Israel in its defensive operations against Iran, Tehran certainly believes we are. They see us as a key ally of Israel and also attribute to Britain a disproportionate level of influence over US actions. We are therefore a high priority target for Iranian terrorism. Don't forget only weeks ago seven Iranians were arrested here on allegations of preparing terrorist attacks and other security offences. And in 2015 our security service disrupted an Iranian-backed bomb plot on the outskirts of London. The threat from Tehran has significantly increased since the latest arrests, with Iran under attack and the ayatollahs desperate to find effective ways of hitting back at Israel and its allies. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has long positioned sleeper cells in European countries including the UK for precisely the situation they find themselves in now. This was a known specific threat back in the early 2000s, when I was working for the UK Joint Intelligence Committee. We don't know exactly their capabilities but it would be irresponsible not to assume that terrorist attacks in Britain could be initiated from Tehran at any time. The fact that the British Government has repeatedly refused to proscribe the IRGC as a terrorist organisation suggests a dangerous degree of complacency. That should have happened a long time ago and certainly should happen now. Beyond the very real and immediate threat from Iran there is Russia. Putin has identified Britain as its number one enemy in Europe. We have led the way in supporting Ukraine both economically and militarily. British intelligence and surveillance have been a critical element of Kyiv's operations against Russia. Donated British tanks and other armoured vehicles are in Ukraine now and our long range missiles have been used to attack Russian forces both inside Ukraine and on Russian sovereign territory. Furthermore, like Iran, Putin has previously ordered terrorist strikes on UK soil, including a nerve agent attack in Salisbury in 2018. Since then suspected Russian sabotage has been suspected here and cyber attacks carried out against government and private sector targets. Security, even of military bases, can never be 100 per cent; but this penetration of RAF Brize Norton by the Palestine Action activists, brazen enough to cross the airfield on electric scooters, shows the most serious shortcomings. What if they had been armed not with paint but explosives? Those planes could have been destroyed, not temporarily disabled, and airmen could have been killed. What we have seen amounts to an open invitation to even more serious saboteurs and terrorists to attack. The threat is going to get worse, not only from Iran and Russia, but also from people here who hate our country and want to cause us harm. The thousands of illegal immigrants pouring in on small boats, with no way to screen, document or control them, adds yet another dimension. All of Britain's military bases, as well as other critical targets, should immediately be placed on a war footing, where they should have been at least since we started supporting Ukraine and even more so since Iran came under attack.
Reuters
34 minutes ago
- Reuters
German military deems Russia 'existential risk' to nation and Europe, Spiegel reports
Berlin, June 20 (Reuters) - The German military deems Russia an "existential risk" to the country and Europe, according to a Spiegel news magazine report that cites a new Bundeswehr strategy paper. The confidential document warns that the Kremlin is aligning both its industrial and leadership structures "specifically to meet the requirements for a large-scale conflict against NATO by the end of this decade." Russia is verifiably preparing for a conflict with NATO, particularly by strengthening forces in western Russia "at the borders with NATO," the report cites the strategy paper as saying. As early as next year, Russia could have around 1.5 million soldiers on active duty, according to the paper. Germany can only counter this threat "with a consistent development of military and society-wide capabilities," the document concludes. Military personnel and experts developed the strategy paper over the past 18 months to serve as a guideline for the future direction of Germany's Bundeswehr, the Spiegel report said. The defence ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz recently backed U.S. President Donald Trump's demand to hike NATO's defence spending target to 5% of national GDP, a major shift made possible by a historic loosening of Berlin's constitutional debt brake.
Reuters
an hour ago
- Reuters
Russia and Ukraine swap more POWs in second exchange in two days
MOSCOW/KYIV, June 20 (Reuters) - Russia and Ukraine completed another round of prisoner exchanges on Friday, officials in both countries said, part of a recent agreement to swap POWs and the bodies of dead soldiers. Neither Russian nor Ukrainian officials specified how many people were involved in the exchange, the second in two days. Writing on X, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said most of his country's POWs had been held by Russia for more than two years, and had been captured across various parts of the sprawling front line. Russia's defence ministry said the Russian POWs included in the exchange were currently in Belarus, which shares borders with both warring countries. The two countries have carried out a series of swaps of captured troops and the remains of dead soldiers since renewing peace talks in Istanbul last month after a gap of more than three years.
