LVIV, Ukraine (Reuters) – When the air-raid siren went off mid-funeral on Tuesday there was no pause from the priest and scarcely a blink from mourners, who ignored the threat of Russian missiles to bury loved ones killed by them two days before.
Inside the baroque Saints Peter and Paul Garrison Church in Lviv, hundreds assembled to pay their respects to four soldiers, including one who had buried his brother only days before.
All were among the 35 killed by a Russian air strike on Yavoriv military base on Sunday, in which missiles penetrated farther into Ukraine than at any time during the three-week conflict, landing just 20km from the border with Poland.
Mothers hugged the coffins as weeping family members laid flowers – some blue and yellow after the Ukrainian flag – atop the polished wood.
Pallbearers carried away the bodies of Oleh Yashchyshyn, Kyrylo Vyshyvanyi, Rostyslav Romanchuk and Serhiy Melnyk.
Three were laid to rest at the military memorial of the city’s historic Lychakiv Cemetery, the most famous cemetery in Ukraine, while a fourth went to his family’s plot in a small village near Lviv.
It was the second blow within a fortnight for Vyshyvanyi’s family, who buried his younger brother Vasyl on March 4. Also a soldier, he was killed near the southern city of Mykolayiv, hundreds of kilometers away.
The most senior of those killed was Oleh Yashchyshyn, whose daughter was also in Yavoriv but was not seriously wounded.
One child carried a teddy bear, the words ‘Love, Love, Love’ imprinted on a strap around her shoulder.
As the priest assured their families that the quartet’s loss was not in vain, the choir chanted the encomium “Memory Eternal” in Ukrainian.
(Reporting by Kai Pfaffenbach, Andriy Perun, Oleksandr Kozhukhar, Margaryta Chornokondratenko and Stephen Farrell in Lviv; Editing by Mike Collett-White)
