Corridor

How to evacuate the civilian population from occupied Sudzha if the warring parties cannot or do not want to agree, and people do not believe either one or the other

Father Sergius

Father Sergius wrote to me after the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ invasion of the Kursk region. Before that, we talked ten years ago, when I was reporting on environmental protests in the Voronezh region. Local residents rebelled against nickel mining, blocked drilling sites, and Father Sergius was among the dissatisfied. A priest in vestments gives a protest event a sense of solidity—that’s why in both Russia and Ukraine the authorities are trying so hard to control the church.

Father was a large man with a red beard and a very open face. When I went to his house, I saw that they lived very modestly. He said that he works mainly in construction and finishing.

“Although last summer I was tending goats, a local herd.” It's a terribly stupid job, you walk and walk with them all day. It’s good when it’s calm, they walk in a line, otherwise they’ll get scared of something and run away - the dog just helped out...

Father Sergius said that he serves in the homes of parishioners. Previously, in his native Sudzha, he served officially, but then he was kicked out.

- For what?

— For violation of church discipline. For disagreement with the views of the church authorities. I paid for my needs according to the official price list; I considered it impossible for myself to take more money. Christenings, funeral services - thirty rubles, not three hundred, like other priests. And then they came up to me and said: “Are you lowering our prices? You will have problems."

- Did they just say that?

- Yes, of course, just like that. This is the first time you've heard it, or what? We complained to the dean. But I didn’t share with him the money that parishioners donated to the temple. I didn’t take it for myself and didn’t share it with my superiors, I bought what was needed in the church. Well, they suspended me and took me out of the state. But by this moment I was already very disgusted with being in this company myself. Then I met the catacomb bishop, who gave me an antimension*, and I began to serve.

I remember thinking how lucky this guy was that he was kicked out of the Russian Orthodox Church. Years of ordeal, construction, and livestock made him somehow real.

“You know, the only depressing thing is that you have to work almost all the time to feed your family.” The children have grown up and need clothes. While we were little, the parishioners helped, they gave us used clothes, but now we need new ones. I don't serve much, it upsets me...

His image was completely out of date, more likely from somewhere from the 19th century, from Leskov - a rural priest with a difficult life, poverty, service, and a tired family. Suffering because he serves so little, waiting for every liturgy as a holiday.

- The main problem is not nickel, but the fact that no one here cares about anyone, no one takes anyone into account. That's all about it. But all this chatter is terribly boring - to be honest, I am for decisive action.

- Which ones are these?

- Only prayer! Yes, you can fight with them, break everything - but they will still be stronger. We must act where we are stronger. I am absolutely sure that if all the people went out there and prayed together, then the Lord would save us from this nickel, would find a way...

The Lord, oddly enough, found it - nickel prices fell and the project was frozen.

Trip to Sudzha

I was probably the only journalist he knew, so ten years later Father Sergius suddenly wrote to me. He said that his parents and sister did not want to leave Suja. When the shooting began, he only managed to persuade them to buy food for a week and a gas cylinder, and also fill a full bath of water. He was unable to get through to him again.

By the time he fixed the car and got there to take them out, it was already too late. The news also said that the situation was under control, the Ministry of Emergency Situations answered: we don’t know, wait for official news, we can’t do anything, everything will be fine.

He tried to drive into the city at his own risk - first along the highway, and then by a roundabout route.

— On the Lgovsky ring, on the road, there were concrete blocks, the asphalt was beaten by caterpillars. We drove quickly, and around the turn to Lyubimovka we began to see burnt out cars on the side of the road. A helicopter flew very low and scared me a little. Before the turn to Bolshoye Soldatskoye there was an abandoned cannon. We turned into the village, there were no people on the street, some white Niva was driving around the village - I thought it was from the village council going around the houses. To the right, towards Porechny, there were explosions and smoke. I read that further on the road has already been mined by someone. We drove through Kamyshnoye, where at first we thought that fog had descended, but when we came out there was smoke with the smell of gunpowder.

“We have four children,” said the wife. - Don't go forward.

Having turned off the car, Father Sergius realized that there was no sound around. The houses were empty, there was no light in the windows anywhere. Near the gates, cows stood silently, which no one had met, geese sat in flocks, and dogs ran here and there.

Although at that moment it seemed to Father Sergius that the villages were empty, in fact a lot of people remained in Sudzha and the surrounding area, mostly old people like his parents.

In Ukraine, I also saw grandmothers and grandfathers who, when the front approached, simply locked the gate. They absolutely did not understand what to do with the chickens and cattle, and sat in paralysis, hoping that *** would not come inside the yard.

A month or two later, such a grandmother, but without an arm, was taken out by volunteers, risking their lives - leaving behind a hut destroyed by a shell and a grandfather buried in the garden.

Roskomnadzor

In Kursk, Father Sergius found complete confusion; government agencies, besieged by tens of thousands of refugees, only shrugged it off. Tatyana Mozgovaya, one of the remaining relatives, recounted her dialogue with the official.

— Where did you get the information that there were people left there?

— So, Ukrainian websites are full of videos with them.

— We don’t look at such sites.

People looking for relatives did not understand where to turn until they found a place where they were not sent - “LizaAlert”. In their group on VK, relatives began to leave requests, and soon the minimum number of those remaining became known - 698 people. But a few days later the shop was closed - Roskomnadzor blocked the group and prohibited LisaAlert from publishing information about the missing. The fact that the evacuation was not carried out and at least seven hundred old people remained in the occupied area did not go well with the slogan “We do not abandon our own,” so the authorities tried to simply hush up the issue.

Father Sergius asked for advice on how to get his relatives out. The situation is sad: in the conditions of modern urban battles it is difficult to survive, no basements can save you anymore. I asked my friends in Kyiv, they said that Ukrainian volunteers would not go there. It became clear that only evacuation or a humanitarian corridor could help. I asked if there was some kind of association of relatives, Father Sergius said no, people rush around alone. I suggested that together they could demand that the Russian and Ukrainian authorities open the corridor. And that his rank allows him to engage in such an initiative. Father Sergius replied: “I’m already calling my friends. It’s hard to gather people - everyone is busy surviving. I'm trying."

Corridor

I mistakenly believed that humanitarian corridors were provided for by the Geneva Convention. But Gleb Bogush, a specialist in international law, dispelled my hopes: in 1949, this idea, unfortunately, did not occur to the creators of the Convention, and the opening of the corridors was the good will of the warring parties. True, fortunately, it contains other norms: for example, a ban on the use of civilians as “human shields”. Ukraine has repeatedly stated that it adheres to the Convention - so it can be asked to release civilians.

- Here, however, you need to understand the logic of the occupation. Without people at all, it’s not very interesting,” Bogush noted skeptically.

However, on August 15, Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Irina Vereshchuk said that Ukraine is ready to open the corridor and is waiting for an official request from Russia. She also announced that a hotline has been opened for residents of Suja regarding evacuation issues. (I tried to call there, nothing worked. And it’s not very clear how the Sujans, who have no contact left, would call it. But it sounded reassuring.)

The idea of ​​​​demanding a corridor caused a quick response - the relatives had at least some kind of plan. Sudzhan activist Tatyana Mozgovaya organized a group of relatives of missing people. In a couple of days, Father Sergius recruited forty people, this was enough for a start. Father Sergiy sent five identical letters - to Putin, Zelensky, the International Red Cross and the Russian and Ukrainian ombudsmen, Moskalkova and Lubinets. In addition, he sent a collective statement about missing people to the Ministry of Emergency Situations. I wanted to send copies to fellow journalists and all the politicians whose contacts I had. Unexpectedly for myself, sitting in Georgia, I found myself the secretary of the campaign to rescue the Sudzhan grannies.

Wassermans

Suddenly Father Sergius called me:

- Sasha, I just have one question. Do you think all these (...) won’t let us down?

- Who?

- Well, the Yavlinskys, the Wassermans. People are not important to them, they just use us and throw us out.

For a few seconds I thought about what to do, then I said that I don’t divide people by nationality and I don’t advise him. Father Sergius became quiet, realizing that he had shown complete sincerity in vain. The next day I asked who to send the letters to - do we take everyone or not?

- Let's take it. I hope I don't have to deal with them personally. I am not an anti-Semite, I am for Christ...

Shlosberg**, Yavlinsky, Gannushkina** and Father Mikhnov-Vaitenko** immediately responded to my request. Lev Shlosberg, whom I did not have time to warn about everything, called Father Sergius to find out some details.

“I spoke with Lev today,” he wrote in the evening. - Such a sincere person.

I thought that at least something good came out of this idea.

As you might guess, the patriotic bloggers whom Father Sergius asked to distribute the letter refused to help.

Since the front in Sudzha froze, press interest in her waned. We realized that a prominent speaker was needed to voice the problem, and we asked Dmitry Muratov**. His status as a Nobel Peace Prize laureate allowed him to put forward such initiatives. Muratov quickly responded, and the news spread.

Father Grigory Mikhnov-Vaitenko undertook to help us through the channels of the Bilateral Contact Group. Suddenly I found myself in close correspondence with two priests, which had never happened to me before.

Peskov

“Sasha, they keep calling me,” Father Sergius wrote in the morning. — There are already about a hundred people. We gave people hope.

I replied that I really didn’t want to disappoint them later. However, it is clear that the hardest thing in such a situation is to sit back. The number of signatures grew quickly, soon there were already five hundred families. On September 17, journalists asked Dmitry Peskov about Sujan’s letter, and he replied that they had not received anything and this was the first time they had heard about such a thing. I wanted, of course, to say that the president’s website gives official notification of the receipt of the letter, but this was not important - the main thing was that the topic could not be hushed up. Kommersant, Novaya and major world media outlets have already written about the old people remaining in Sudzha - the BBC, the New York Times, Der Spiegel, Stern, etc.

Journalists began calling Father Sergius. I advised him to remain as neutral as possible so as not to anger either side, but he complained that he was again speaking very emotionally and that he was berating himself.

We waited almost a week for a response to the statement to the Ministry of Emergency Situations about the disappearance of five hundred people, and finally they replied that they could do nothing. In fact, this was true, we just wanted them not to say later, like Peskov, that they were not aware of the issue at all.

By the way, the answer finally came from Putin. True, the letter was forwarded from the president’s reception to the Ministry of Defense, and from there it was sent down somewhere else, so that in the end it was the deputy commander of a certain military unit 45880, V. Kalganov, who responded to the letter. He told Father Sergius that “there are no operating humanitarian corridors between the Russian Federation and Ukraine, the Ukrainian leadership is not agreeing to dialogue on their opening.” One way or another, this was the official answer.

Soon a response came from Kyiv, from the office of the Ombudsman of Ukraine. They wrote the same thing: “Due to the fact that the Russian side refuses to provide a humanitarian corridor and does not make contact with the Ukrainian side and international organizations, the evacuation of the civilian population is not possible.”

Sudzhan residents never received a response from Tatyana Moskalkova’s office. Although, through unofficial channels, I found out that the Russian Ombudsman is aware of the problem and would like to help. Many human rights activists, declared “foreign agents” in Russia, still treat Moskalkova with respect, considering her a caring person. But it was clear that she couldn’t get into trouble.

Father Grigory Mikhnov-Vaitenko was somehow able to deliver the letter to the President of the Red Cross, Mirjana Spoljarić, on the eve of her conversation with Putin and Lavrov. But the ICRC is a non-public organization and does not disclose the results of negotiations. When Ukrainian authorities invited the Red Cross to visit Sudzha, Peskov said it was a provocation. That's basically where everything got stuck.

Valentina Frolovna

On September 15, Katya, the granddaughter of Valentina Frolovna, an old woman who remained in the village of Cherkasskoye-Porechnoye, but then was able to cross the front line, sent us a voicemail. The old woman was in the hospital, in a very weak condition, she couldn’t really speak, but Katya relayed her story.

- They were sitting in the basement - those who remained from their street, five people. There is nothing to eat or drink. If you go out to the garden, there are tomatoes, but you won’t have time, because pigs, cattle walk everywhere, dogs, and they ate everything. Their neighbor was the first to be killed - he went to collect something in the garden, and he was killed by a drone. Two days later, the wife came out, wanted to drag him, bury him - and a drone flew straight into her neck, and she sat down on her knees, her head fell from her shoulders. What remained were two women in their late eighties and a man, Uncle Lenya Foglev, about sixty. He went out and tried to get something to eat. They confused him a little: “Why didn’t you leave, old man?” “And I,” he says, “have nowhere to go.” They say: “Well, in vain.” He found somewhere a pack of cookies, a bottle of water, and gave out a cookie and water a day.

The grandmother and another woman pulled the bodies into a neighboring house and covered them. That same night the house was burned down.

Grandmother says that they are beating house after house along the street, I don’t know who, the street is completely destroyed. And the grandmother and the woman went to look, and these bodies were burned to the ground, the skull was someone’s.

And this man, he disappeared. The dog was with him, his yard dog, it followed him - neither he nor the dog was there. And at first that woman left, and the grandmother remained waiting for him. And he’s gone, and we still don’t know whether he’s alive or not. Grandmother sat for three more days and realized that she was going to die anyway, she was old and diabetic, come what may. And she went at three o’clock in the afternoon and came across the military: “If you want, shoot.” They said: “Fuck it, we need you, go wherever you want.” And she wandered off, hid from the drones under the trees and went out to the Berdin farm. The entire planting there is scorched, the trees are just skeletons. There was some kind of rut with soot, she lay there overnight, and in the morning she heard voices - two young soldiers, ours. They gave her something to drink and said: “Grandma, walk along the path along the planting, don’t stick your head out onto the road.”

Until then, the only evidence was benign videos shot by Ukrainian military officers.

Chechens

From time to time, Father Sergius fell into despair, and he began to be tossed in different directions. “I wish I could find a Chechen general,” he sighed. Although he could not explain how he could help us, it seems, like many, he believed in the supernatural abilities of the Chechens. He suggested writing to Kadyrov, Alaudinov and Lukashenko. I explained that Kadyrov’s participation in this process is unlikely to find understanding on the Ukrainian side.

Once, Father Sergius got through to the person on duty at Moskalkova’s office, and she advised him not to write any more collective letters, not to demand anything, but to write to the Ombudsman on his own behalf, “to ask her in a purely human way.” Father Sergius wrote an ingratiating letter. I tried to explain to him that this was pointless, and he replied that we had to give up everything altogether, nothing would come of it anyway, no matter what we were trying to do. I saw that he was falling into this state of learned helplessness, in which the whole people lives, and in it all that remains is to rely on the authorities.

- Yes, I'm naive. But I never wanted to communicate with these “politicians.” To me they are scammers. Now I just have to. I'm looking forward to being able to just forget about this interaction.

From time to time he complained that with all this correspondence he did not have time to work at all, he returned from the construction site at night, there was no money.

- Sasha, of course, I will continue, but I honestly admit that I no longer believe in a positive outcome. Waiting for a miracle is a sin.

And hoping for a miracle is the only option. It comes out weak - I get embittered.

All sorts of well-wishers called Father Sergius and explained to him that if he made it to the jump, he would be imprisoned.

I advised him to take the threats seriously, but only if the authorities called.

- Okay, let's break through! - Father Sergius was brave. “The main thing is that the children are not harmed.” People would like to help.

I saw that he was scared. It’s easy to maintain a balanced attitude if it’s not your parents who are under fire and it’s not you who can be imprisoned.

This whole story was a surprise for him, and sometimes he suddenly shared his thoughts:

- Sasha, you understand, this is just a pattern. After all, this did not happen in any area of ​​the region. Why? Honestly, because there is no more dirty in moral terms of the district in our region than Suzhansky. What they did in our deanery, because it’s a shame to even say aloud ...

Group

Sometimes I climbed into the group of Suzhan dedicated to the search for relatives - and immediately crawled out. The Ukrainians were called exclusively crests there, it was some kind of evidence, they are enemies. “And I think so, it is to go to someone else's country, from where all the anger and danger,” some woman wrote about the idea to take out people through Ukraine.

Someone enthusiastically posted a video where a Ukrainian prisoner with tape tangled eyes stands on his knees. Sometimes I did not understand if I wanted to help these people, but then I told myself that there would be fools everywhere.

Fortunately, Father Sergius tried to extinguish all the conversations out of business and only constantly called on Sudzhan to pray:

- Curses in the history of mankind have not yet helped anyone. But prayer, all the more common, works miracles. Believe me, we can only hope for the aid of God now. Because the earthly power is not on our side. In the final result, we will all appear before the person of God, and everyone will give an answer for their affairs and receive deserts. But not from us, but from the Creator.

In this situation, this was not the worst advice.

But, by the way, the statements of the Russian authorities Sudzhan were evaluated adequately. And when the Nebenja said to the UN that Ukraine was satisfied with the concentration camp for civilians in Sudzhi, no one believed him, but everyone was very scared that this could be an excuse to attack the city.

Foreign Ministry

At the end of September, I was in Kakheti, on the collection of grapes, when Father Sergius suddenly called and said that a certain Rodion Miroshnik from the Foreign Ministry calls for relatives and searches for the facts of the pressure and export of people to Ukraine. Obviously, the Foreign Ministry decided to intercept the initiative, raise the noise of concentration camps or violent deportation of residents.

I remember that it was smeared straight. It was not surprising, of course, not the lies itself, but the fact that people pour this slurry without thinking about the elderly in the basements. They calmly did something that could disrupt the negotiations on evacuation, for the sake of some idiotic PR. It dawned on me that these people do not think about physical reality at all, they do not believe that it has a relationship with them, they are inside some kind of game. I replied that we can’t do anything with this, you just have to continue to make noise.

- Yes, I agree. To without regret to look your relatives into the eyes ... alive or dead.

A month later, Tatyana Moskalkova told reporters that she had statements from thousands of Sudzhi residents, whose relatives were forcibly taken to Ukraine. It was a shame to listen to how a respected person carries it, but probably this was her payment for the opportunity to work on the situation. (Later, Moskalkova said that she has 11 such statements, you can believe in this figure.)

We dropped our hands several times - it was not clear what to do. But Father Sergius brought me out of a stupor with “encouraging” messages.

- We began a real winter, with frost and snow. The chances to survive in such conditions to sick people are zero. Time has gone.

We decided that we must at least do something. Most likely, our letters do not affect anything - but at least people will not think that they were folding back when their parents froze in the basement.

Svetlana Lyakhova, cousin of father Sergius, went to Moscow to the reception of the president, the State Duma, the Federation Council. In Kursk, Suzhana staged a rally on the main square. The head of the Department for Interaction with Local Self -Government, which has gone to refugees, immediately stated that their action was illegal. The result was a 20-thousandth fine to the organizer and the dismissal of the head of the Sudzhansky district.

Request

So, we had the official answers of both parties that the other side did not go to negotiations. What did we do with them? Ukrainian answers looked better. Firstly, they answered from Kyiv quickly, and secondly, it is logical: we are ready to open the corridor, but we are waiting for the official request of Russia. The only thing we had to have here was to convince the Russian authorities to send such a request and tell reporters how things are.

It seems to be easier: write one sentence! But it is clear that no one will ask. It seems to us that you just need to save people, and there - serious issues are resolved. We understood that Suzhans could just be lucky or out of luck. And all that we can with Father Sergius is to warm up the question, hoping to impregnate something at the right moment.

In addition, we guessed that official answers have little to do with reality. Judging by them, everything rested against this stupid request. But logic suggested that those with operational control are made by the decision on the humanitarian corridor. In fact, it rather depended on the goodwill of the Ukrainian authorities. We thought: perhaps they are ready to evacuate if they get something for it? I asked Kyiv friends what could it be.

- Maybe exchange them for civilian civilian? - suggested one friend. I got a lot of fire: there are Ukrainian civilians from the territories controlled by Russia in prisons, they are neatly calculated by human rights activists. According to the Kursk governor, about two thousand people remained in the Sudzhansky district. How great it would be to exchange everyone for everyone ...

But familiar human rights activists explained that the matter would not burn out: Ukraine will not participate in such an exchange that resembles human trafficking. It remains just to count on her goodwill. Who could persuade the Kyiv authorities to make such a decision? Father Sergius and I composed a letter to the Pope, acquaintances in Kuria promised Father Gregory that he would lay Francis on the table. Two weeks after that, I to no avail monitor the Vatican website. However, we have already begun to understand that in such matters, public statements are only the top of the iceberg.

Peter

From the very beginning, our task was to find his own Father Sergius. But they lived on the outskirts of Sudzhi, far from the boarding school, where many civilians gathered, where the Ukrainian military brought the humanitarian and where journalists were filmed a lot. I asked my friends if there may be volunteers who will go to Suju. They answered me that no one would help the Russians. As a result, one friend of the journalist said that she was ready to go there if we pay her gasoline. But Father Sergius rejected the idea:

- Parents live on the station, this is 4 km from the school. Drones fly there, it is very dangerous. No need, Sasha, let him not at risk.

Video from drones could really be found online, and Father Sergius saw his house on it.

- Okay, Sasha, you do not worry, for all God's will. Otherwise, I would not have taken care of this.

But in early November, Father Sergius was amused-through fellow countrymen, he contacted volunteer Peter, who nevertheless travels to Sudzhu. My friends were mistaken - such volunteers were found, and in the firing of the Sumy. For me, this was precisely the most exciting news. Peter drove to his relatives Father Sergius, they were alive and even found somewhere a potbelly stove. Father went for firewood, my sister and mother were afraid, did not go anywhere.

-He is stingy with answers, he says, the phone is checked at the entrance and exit. I talked yesterday, but it was more a monologue. He says: “Yours need to be taken urgently, they are greenhouse, not from this world. In Sudge, everything is plundered, recently opened warehouses at a meat processing plant. I ask them: "Why don't you go, do not gain sausages?" “No, we are not used to it, we cannot do that.” They will not survive there.

Peter said that it is dangerous to move around the city, there are a lot of drones that hunt for cars. Therefore, at first they walked. But then they got acquainted with people more and more, it became clear that you could not get around everyone, they still began to ride.

He says: “We quickly drive into the area, drive the car into some garage, go around the neighbors there, then quickly to another district ...” Volunteers became a link between Sudzhany and their families-they were written to the phone of video messages, came to Sumy and sent relatives. And those in the same way sent vidos in response.

Parents of Father Sergius asked Peter to bring them medicine. He bought something for his money, and some asked to buy us. One Kiev friend found medicine, sent to Sumy, and a few days later they arrived at Swell, it was a small miracle.

Evacuation

Russia has not sent a public request. But on November 2, Father Gregory called me:

- I'm afraid to reassure, but I came from the red cross. Nothing new is written there, they say, we are aware of the problem. But I know from experience that they never answer if everything is bad.

On November 9, Tatyana Moskalkova unexpectedly published a video in which she in Belarus talks with the Ukrainian Ombudsman Dmitry Lubinz, unloading some Ukrainian old woman out of the Red Cross, who decided to go to children to Russia. It was a good sign: firstly, it could be assumed that the granny is tested. Secondly, if two major officials of Ukraine and Russia are talking, this means that something is changing in the world. On November 22, Moskalkova reported that the red cross also, through Belarus, was taken out by 46 residents of Sudzhi - children, disabled people, etc. It was a very small part of the people, but whether it was so - the evacuation began. For joy, I wrote to Father Gregory:

-It seems that Moskalkov and Lubinz still agreed.

- They did not agree.

- And who, if not a secret?

- The main role of the Red Cross.

One way or another, we were terribly grateful to everyone.

Cat food

A few days later, Father Sergius called me, terribly upset.

- Sasha, we have such a problem. The people who were taken out gave an interview to Komsomolskaya Pravda that the Ukrainians mocked them there. Both Peter and his friends very painfully reacted to this, they say: probably, we will not carry anyone else.

I climbed to read the article. Fortunately, people themselves did not say anything bad. But the military -military officer Alexander Kotz, who interviewed them, wrote from himself, “as men dozens of dozens are driven into trucks and taken to Ukraine. Here an analogy begs with the Great Patriotic War, then the chicken was also stolen - to Germany. ” I again marveled at the fact that people are ready to engage in propaganda, which directly leads to the death of the people who believe her.

“And the second problem,” Father Sergius complained, “people massively refuse to go.” Some fool went into the boarding school and either glued the article on the stand, or said that you are taken to Ukraine only in order to cut it to the authorities. And people picked up this instantly.

Peter said that he was walking around the yards and persuading people to sign up for evacuation.

- He says: how we just didn’t persuade them, we understand how it will end, we have been living in this for three years. We go to people, show the video what cities turn into during the battles. "You downloaded it from the Internet, this is all not true." He says there are people who are pleasant to come to, but there are those that you no longer want. He says: it beats in pride, but we do not stop. Peter suggested to my sister: "Let me take you to the boarding school to sign up for evacuation and bring you back." There you are appointed: to come to such and such a time. “And then I’ll come on purpose, I’ll take all three, I’ll take it and immerse it in the Red Cross car.”

Even according to reports in a group of relatives, I saw what people think.

“But not our ... but crests, and therefore scary ours there. And so without everything, in ignorance, and even if they take it there, it’s scary ... Housing the earth at home, everyone’s native, that's why they are afraid ... ”

- Sash, and my relatives are the same! - Father Sergius lamented. -A little better, some kind of connection appeared, they helped them, and they relaxed. They are afraid to leave animals, they are afraid that the house will be plundered. They do not understand what's what. I was in shock when they asked me to transport cat food to them. I wrote them a very emotional message, I say: “Do you understand how many people pray for you?! Dozens, maybe even hundreds of people! Therefore, you are alive! But it will end! "

Shura Burtin, correspondent of Reportagen magazine, especially for the "none newspaper

* Antimins-in Orthodoxy there is a quadrangular boards from silk or linen matter with a particle of the relics of any Orthodox martyr sewn into it. It is a necessary affiliation for the full liturgy and at the same time a document allowing the liturgy.

** included by the Russian authorities in the register of "foreign Agents".

This material was released in the third issue of the New Gazeta. Magazine". You can buy it in the online store of our partners .