Last night the enemy targeted the very heart — the Assumption Cathedral of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra.
The sanctuary, which is almost a thousand years old. The place where Christianity began on our lands. This is a crime against the world’s heritage and the memory of the entire Christian world. Just think, they are destroying a sanctuary older than Moscow itself.
This is done by a state that hypocritically “kisses icons” while directing missiles at monasteries, hospitals, and residential buildings. The next time dictator Putin gives a history lesson or talks about Orthodoxy — just show him this photo. Today the world saw the true value of his words.
Thank you to the Air Force, who are now fighting for the Ukrainian sky. Thanks also to the rescuers who are risking their lives to clear the debris and contain the fires.
The strike on the Lavra proves a simple point: the Muscovites are not the Rus people.
True descendants of Rus would preserve their cultural and historical heritage. But for them, it is, of course, foreign. For centuries on the external stage, the nation of orcs pretends to be “descendants of Rus.”
Putin not long ago (when the freak was still allowed on Europe’s doorstep) told Macron strange stories about “the Russian princess Anna Yaroslavna.” The daughter of a Kyiv prince supposedly unites the peoples of France and Moscow. This fool wrote articles that modern Russia originates from the “baptismal font of Chersonesus,” because in our Korsun, now occupied by Muscovites, Kyiv Prince Volodymyr was once baptized.
Isn’t this the madness of lunatics?
But this nonsense is seriously being drilled into the heads of children from various tribes within the Russian Federation through school textbooks. As a result, Permians, Bashkirs, Tatars, and even the clearly Mongoloid Buryats grow up believing that they are Orthodox Russians. Then, cognitive dissonance leads them to wonder: why is their Kyiv controlled by some fascist Ukrainians?
The priests of the Kremlin cult only need to offer the robbed and impoverished natives a solution — to go to a religious war, selling their souls to the devil for a pittance.
But today the swamp savages are launching a targeted strike on the Lavra. Simply out of helplessness at not being able to capture Ukraine, they take out their rage on its most valuable cultural monument, which they claim to consider theirs. Their weak cultural identity cannot withstand competition — all the temples in the RF are newer and do not compare historically to the thousand-year-old temples of Kyiv or even Chernihiv, and thus have never been able to effectively unite the Muscovites.
And that’s why the ancestors from the NKVD mined and blew up the cultural monument in 1941 when retreating from the Germans, understanding that they could no longer own the Rus’ heritage. Because it housed the burial places of all Ukrainian princes since the times of Rus’. With such evidence of the ancient statehood of a people, which they unsuccessfully tried to incorporate into their kinless tribe as a younger branch, this ISIS could not reconcile.
In fact, this karmic cycle was started by the “first Velikoross” Andrey Bogolyubsky, who began his career by plundering the Kyiv sanctuary and was therefore branded as a foreigner in Rus’ by authors of contemporary Rus’ chronicles.
But Muscovites are not only foreigners on the planet, they are anti-Christians.
And this is significant.
Because many Christians around the world are disillusioned with the narrative in their countries and sympathize with Russia, mistakenly believing that RF is a “Christian state defending values lost by the West”. Many, even in the USA, get excited when there are attempts to ban the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine.
However, the Russian Putin-glorifying church today has not condemned the Russian army for striking a Christian shrine. Therefore, even the religious branch of the FSB is an anti-Christian aggressive organization.
They pretend to be Christians but must be expelled from everywhere.
For this strike, there must be punishment — a complete ban of the Russian Orthodox Church. We must intensify the process of rooting out this aggressive sect globally and within our own borders. Every strike will be repaid by the Kremlin’s loss of influence. Then, this process will move into the current RF.
And it will end in Moscow.
In 1941, when the Soviet occupiers were retreating from Kyiv and the Nazis were advancing, the Muscovites blew up the gem of Mazepa Baroque and indeed Ukrainian history — the Dormition Cathedral of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra.
Together with the architectural monument, the burial place of Konstantin Ostrogski was destroyed. For those far from history: Konstantin Ostrogski was a representative of the Ukrainian nobility, one of the most talented military leaders in Europe of his time, one who brilliantly defeated the Muscovites, particularly in the Battle of Orsha. In short, a symbolic figure and national pride.
The photo shows a reconstruction: this is roughly how his tombstone looked. If I were creating a National Pantheon to gather the images and remains of the most distinguished figures of Ukrainian statehood, it would be represented by him, Prince Konstantin Ostrogski, for the period of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. But the Muscovite devils destroyed the princely remains with the explosion of 1941.
They say all the bones found after the debris was cleared are buried somewhere, and hypothetically, this “somewhere” could be found. It might even be possible to organize identification by DNA (since Janusz Ostrogski is buried in Poland), and this would be a good shift in the historical relations with Warsaw, but who is thinking about it.
In the restored Dormition Cathedral, the place and appearance of Konstantin Ostrogski’s tombstone are now being restored. And the Muscovites strike the temple, which, as you understand, is much more than just a Lavra church. For the second time, modern Nazis destroy a place crucial to Ukrainian identity.
Now imagine that in Ukraine, there is a place where, during the war, the remains/cenotaphs of the nation’s prominent figures are gathered at the same coordinates? Yaroslav Volodymyrovych (the Wise), Konstantin Ostrogski, Petro Sahaidachny, Ivan Mazepa, Symon Petliura, Pavlo Skoropadsky, likewise Konovalets, Shukhevych, Melnyk, and Bandera? Or the geolocation of a memorial military cemetery where Oleksandr Udovychenko, Mykhailo Omelyanovych-Pavlenko, Marko Bezruchko, and other distinguished Warriors of Ukraine from different times rest? Or imagine there is a geolocation of a memorial cemetery where Ukraine already returns outstanding figures of science, culture, and politics of the past and where it buries the worthies of the present? Imagined?
What guarantees are there to protect the remains of prominent figures in Ukrainian history? For the Muscovite, the aim of this war is to destroy Ukrainian identity, preferably with all the artifacts on which it is based.
And here is the question in the context of the night shelling. How reasonable is it to push for the return of prominent Ukrainians until the war is paused? Perhaps it’s time to spend the wartime on the full range of preparatory actions? Openly and transparently discuss the optimal format of memorial locations, contemplate the site of memorial structures, conduct discussions among experts on the meaningful content of complexes, organize and carry out architectural and sculptural complexes… in short, undertake quite complex preparatory work.
Yes, you can’t make much electoral gain from this in the nightly grumbles… Yes, the ribbon of the grand opening (the final stage) will be cut by someone who comes after you… But what is more important in matters of memorialization and restoring identity – a situational quick hype for the current political scene or a slow but fundamental advance for the nation?
Indeed, the answer to the question distinguishes a random populist on the throne from a statesman. It’s the difference between “pretending” and “being.”
With colleagues from European Solidarity, we visited the Lavra and the Mystetskyi Arsenal, thanked the rescuers working through the night to dismantle the roof of the Assumption Cathedral and the Arsenal building. We spoke with the leadership of these institutions to combine efforts to protect national shrines, restore them, and hold the Russian Federation accountable.
We urge the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Zelensky to initiate the immediate convening of the UN Security Council, interpreting the barbaric attacks on the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, Mystetskyi Arsenal, Dovzhenko Film Studio, Art Museum in Kharkiv, and the Organ Hall in Odesa as a targeted attack by the Russian Federation on cultural objects, a destruction of Ukrainian national identity, and genocidal practices against Ukraine and its people.
We call on UNESCO to respond harshly to this vandalism and terror, to protect the World Heritage. We are initiating a review of this barbarism at the summer sessions of the PACE and OSCE PA.
Russia must be punished.
We appeal to the Ukrainian authorities to mobilize all efforts and resources to strengthen air defense, procure missiles for Patriot. We appeal to the leadership of the Verkhovna Rada to convene a plenary session of parliament immediately, without waiting for June 30! This week already! Return 40 billion to the Ministry of Defense, direct it to air defense procurement! Examine the expenditures of the Reserve Fund, obtain comprehensive information on where the funds from the fund have gone. The funds must go to the needs of the Armed Forces and restoration of infrastructure, protection of cultural values. We are awaiting a meeting of the faction with the Deputy Prime Minister for Humanitarian Policy, we want to know information about the evacuation and preservation of cultural values.
“EU” initiates an immediate plenary session of the Parliament with the following agenda: funding for air defenses, expenses from the Reserve Fund, inter-parliamentary diplomacy, and Russia’s accountability. Terrorists must be punished.
We thank the rescuers and the Armed Forces of Ukraine, who work 24/7.
Here I go to work every day, meet for coffee, simply walk by walls that have seen more Ukrainian history than Russia can endure without frenzy.
This is my Kyiv. It is a thousand years old. It has seen khans, tsars, general secretaries, “liberators,” occupiers, commissioners, Chekists, and all those who came here believing they could rewrite history with fire.
Today they tried to do it again.
I have no illusions about the “accidental” strikes on the Lavra, the Art Arsenal, the Dovzhenko Film Studio, the House of Organ and Chamber Music in Dnipro, the Art Gallery in Kharkiv.
These are not fragments. This is the essence of this war.
In recent days, Russian propagandists have raged over a Ukrainian drone hitting their “sacred site” — the “Defense of Sevastopol” museum-panorama in occupied Ukrainian Crimea. And here is their response: an attack on Ukrainian memory. At first glance, a primitive “retaliation.” But it’s the only possible imperial logic.
Because this entire war is not only about territories. It is about an attempt to destroy Ukrainian memory, history, cultural code, the very possibility of Ukraine being a separate civilizational story.
That is why it hurts us so much today.
Because the barbarians — and in this war, the Russians act precisely as barbarians — want to burn not just a roof, a wall, or a hall. They want to burn evidence. Evidence that we are not “younger brothers,” not outskirts, not a random political mistake of the XX century by their Lenin.
We are an ancient European nation. With deep roots, with our own culture, our own art, our own memory, our own Kyiv, which was a city when the future empire was still learning to pronounce the word “state” somewhere in the swamps.
Once, philosophers and historians — from Spengler to Toynbee — wrote that the great conflicts of the future could grow out of religious and cultural divides. The Russian war against Ukraine has shown an even more terrifying thing: hatred can be just as fierce between those who formally belong to the same religious tradition if one side cannot endure the mere fact of the other’s existence.
Ukraine for Russia is not just a neighbor. Ukraine is a mirror that reflects how empty Russian imperial mythology is. How poor it is without foreign cities, foreign temples, foreign artists, foreign victories, and foreign history.
Russia is incapable of building the future, so it constantly tries to steal the past. Incapable of development, it expands through conquests despite sacrifices. Unable to persuade, it tries to use missiles as arguments.
This is why they strike at Lavra, museums, theaters, film studios, galleries. Because culture is a territory that cannot be occupied as long as there are people capable of remembering.
They can break the roof, but they cannot break a thousand years of our history. They can set walls on fire, but they cannot burn a city that has long become the nation’s nervous system.
Kyiv is in smoke again. But Kyiv will stand.
And perhaps this proves the most important thing: empires burn from their own hatred. And nations survive thanks to memory.
Russia strikes at Ukrainian culture not because it is weak. But because Ukrainian culture is stronger than all their imperial lies.
We must move into our future with this understanding after terrible nights like tonight. Because this is the foundation on which a completely different Ukraine can be built, one that the world will always look at with respect and admiration.
How long does a person live in this world? Well, let’s say a hundred years. For instance, can you recall people who died two hundred years ago? Or even a hundred?
* * *
All the Stalinist, Khrushchev, panel buildings, and modern constructions, all these shopping centers, cinemas, and private estates will last another two hundred years. Maximum. And then they will turn into a heap of debris, broken bricks, and cracked concrete. The dust will be scattered by the wind, leaving no trace.
* * *
Since the construction of the Lavra, people and buildings have disappeared dozens of times: a thousand years, imagine. Yet it stands, and everything that has happened to it can be touched by hand.
* * *
And so these aggressive, disgraceful idiots are hitting the Lavra with drones. They won’t destroy it, that’s one. Militarily pointless – that’s two. Terror as such – also missing, that’s three. So what have these damned ones achieved? Ha, they have etched themselves into the history of what stood for a thousand years and will stand for another thousand. And not as liberators, not even as conquerors, but precisely as stupid aggressive idiots.
* * *
Commenting here would only spoil the overall impression. Words are unnecessary when there are such actions. It would have been better if they really hit Voronezh, there would be less shame. The devils indeed have gone off the rails, the head doesn’t understand what the hands are doing, and even the overall consequences painted with broad strokes are not being calculated anymore.
* * *
So the old man is done. Hysterics and schizophrenia, and this, in principle, is a good sign. But there will still be bloodshed, as always happens with crazies on the throne, just remember old Adi.
The Russian attack on the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra once again showed the true cost of the Kremlin’s ostentatious piety. One can preach “Christian values” for years, demand the inclusion of clauses about the role of the Russian Orthodox Church in peace agreements, and at the same time target missiles at one of the greatest shrines of the Orthodox world.
When faith is turned into a political tool, the church into a KGB office, and religion is used to justify aggression and genocidal war against a neighboring nation, strikes on temples no longer seem accidental. It’s a natural consequence of complete moral degradation.
A deranged state led by senile figures for whom mass murder, terror, and the destruction of sanctuaries have become almost the only available language of communication with the world.
On the night of June 15, Russia launched a massive strike on Kyiv, damaging the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, a UNESCO World Heritage site with a history spanning almost 1000 years. The attack was condemned by dozens of world leaders, religious figures, and international organizations, urging increased pressure on Russia and continued support for Ukraine, particularly in its path of European integration.
A drone targeted the main temple of the monastery – the Dormition Cathedral, the burial place of Kyiv princes, built between 1073-1078. It survived the 1230 earthquake, the Mongol invasion of 1240, the fire of 1718, and was almost completely destroyed during World War II and rebuilt in 2000.
During the night attack, fires blazed in almost all areas of Kyiv, with emergency rescue services working at about 50 locations. Among the damaged sites were dozens of residential buildings, the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, the largest Nova Poshta terminal in the capital, museums, and other cultural and administrative buildings. In the capital, five people died in the Obolonskyi, Holosiivskyi, and Solomianskyi districts. Dozens were injured. At least 26 residential buildings were damaged.
