Ukrainian writer killed after Russian missile attack on restaurant

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An acclaimed Ukrainian novelist and poet who began documenting Russian war crimes after Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion has died from injuries sustained in a Russian missile strike targeting a crowded restaurant last week. Broke his breath.

Viktoria Amelina, 37, died on Saturday from severe head injuries when a high-precision Russian Iskander missile struck Ria Pizza in the eastern city of Kramatorsk, trapping people under the rubble of the building.

With their deaths over the weekend, the death toll in the attack rose to 13 people, including 14-year-old twin sisters, according to Ukrainian officials. At least 60 other people were injured in the attack.

“With our greatest sadness, we inform you that Ukrainian writer Viktoria Emelina passed away on July 1 at the Mechnikov hospital in Dnipro,” PEN Ukraine and war crimes research group Truth Hounds said in a statement. statement Released on Sunday.

Amelina was dining at Ria Pizza with a delegation of Colombian writers and journalists when the missile struck.

PEN Ukraine said of the Russian forces, “They clearly knew they were shelling a place that had many civilians inside.”

Ukraine’s domestic intelligence service, the SBU, said it had arrested a local man who allegedly helped coordinate the attack and sent video footage of the pizzeria to the Russian military.

Kramatorsk, once a city of 150,000 inhabitants, has lost almost half its population since the start of the Russian invasion. About 25 km from the front line, it is an important hub for humanitarian aid and military logistics, making it a prime target of Russian attacks. In April last year, 63 civilians were killed in a Russian missile attack on the city’s railway station.

Many businesses in Kramatorsk, including hotels and restaurants, have closed since the fighting intensified. Ria Pizza was one of the few eateries that remained open.

Amelina was dining at the restaurant with journalist Catalina Gomez, author Hector Abad Facciolins and former Colombian peace ambassador Sergio Jaramillo, who was in Ukraine on a campaign to underline Latin America’s solidarity with the country.

“I was sitting right next to Victoria. We had just finished a day talking to people in the field about the Russian invasion. As soon as the food was brought to us, I bent down to pick up the napkin and at that moment the missile hit,” Jaramillo told the Financial Times. “Victoria, who was sitting up straight, was hit badly on the back of her neck. But I was fine. Then the whole room fell to pieces and time stopped. I stayed with him and called an ambulance and paramedics.

Amelina was hit by shrapnel or shrapnel. Rescuers took him to a local hospital before he was transferred to a trauma ward in Dnipro, a large city west of the frontline.

“During the last days of her life, Victoria was accompanied by close people and friends,” PEN Ukraine said in a statement.

Since Russia’s invasion last February, Amelina has worked with Truth Hounds to document Russian war crimes, infiltrating the country and visiting forward fronts in eastern and southern Ukraine.

friends and others Author Downhearted After the news of his death, videos of his poetry recitation were shared photographs She has been working in the field to document Russian atrocities.

The Ukrainian Institute in London said, “Victoria Emelina has been one of the most powerful voices telling international audiences about the literature of Ukraine and the war crimes of Russia.”

Emelina was ready to start year-round writer’s residence in Paris this month. She was also collecting stories of women survivors of conflict and researching war crimes for a book War and Justice Diaries: Looking at the Women Who Seen War,

I am the only one in this picture.
I am a Ukrainian writer. I have portraits of great Ukrainian poets on my bag. I guess I should be taking pictures of books, art and my little son. But I document Russia’s war crimes and hear gunfire, not poems. Why? #Russiastop now pic.twitter.com/R50RqacXSZ

– Victoria Emelina 🇺🇦 (@vamelina) 7 June 2022

Born in the western city of Lviv on New Year’s Day in 1986, Amelina spent part of her childhood with her father in Canada before returning to Ukraine, the PEN statement said.

She was the author of two novels including the award winning dom’s dream kingdom, and a children’s book. In 2021, he received the Joseph Conrad-Korzeniowski Literary Prize. In the same year, he founded the New York Literature Festival in the eastern Ukrainian city of New York, near Bakhmut.

Amelina also wrote and recited poetry, giving her final performance at a literary festival in Kiev just three days before the missile attack.

One of his latest poems, titled “Alert”, evokes the everyday reality of Ukrainians facing Russian missiles: “An air raid warning goes over my land / It’s like they’re about to kill us.” Here it is again / But just one shot / It’s usually someone random / Not today / Another day gone.”

Amelina’s recent work includes publication A diary kept by fellow Ukrainian writer Volodymyr Vakulenko, who was abducted and murdered by Russian soldiers near Izyum in the eastern Kharkiv region last spring. Before being taken, Vakulenko buried his writings. Amelina discovered these in September.

Jaramillo said, “Victoria Emelina was a woman of extraordinary courage who put her successful writing career on hold to document war crimes and herself became a victim of a Russian war crime.”

Amelina is survived by her younger son.

Additional reporting by John Paul Rathbone in London