‘Relatives need to say goodbye’: Meet Ukraine’s body collectors who take fallen soldiers home from the frontline
Dealing with death is the grimmest reality of war – something few understand better than Taras.
The sergeant is part of a unit tasked with collecting the bodies of Ukrainian soldiers killed in action from morgues near the frontline and delivering them back to their families.
“I try to return our fallen warriors home as soon as possible,” Taras, 44, told Sky News as he drove his lorry through the city of Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine.
“Their relatives need to say goodbye and bury them as it should be. So, that is my mission.”
It is a relentless cycle for him and the rest of the On The Shield team as Ukraine battles wave after wave of Russian attacks along the frontline across the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
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The Ukrainian authorities have not released figures of their war dead, but Western officials have put the number at more than 100,000 killed and injured since Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion on 24 February 2022. The Russian toll is even higher, with the United States most recently saying the death toll alone was some 188,000.
Just one morning spent with Taras offered a sense of the scale of Ukraine’s loss.
He collected the bodies of 22 soldiers from two morgues alone.
Taras said seeing first-hand the price that his country is paying can become too much to bear.
“Sometimes I can’t sleep because of the young boys and girls,” he said.
“Sometimes I cry – like any normal person. Sometimes when I get back to our base, I am just lying there thinking and crying.”
Taras’s truck shuttles between frontline morgues and slain soldiers’ families
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Yet he puts on a brave face when greeting other members of the Shield team – part of the Ukrainian armed forces – as well as workers at the morgues and the medics, who retrieve the fallen from the battlefield and transport them to the frontline body-holding facilities.
They exchange greetings and hug.
Asked how he managed to keep smiling when dealing with death every day, Taras said: “It’s hard but we try to find a moment to smile. I call home, talk to my wife, to my children, parents, brothers. After that, my heart is warm and I want to smile.”
At the first morgue we visited with Taras in Kramatorsk, four bodies were waiting, each in a white, plastic body bag, with the name and date of birth of each of the deceased written in marker pen, where known.
The purpose of On The Shield is to return the military dead with dignity to their loved ones.
Working with officials at the morgue, the first two body bags were carefully carried forward and unzipped.
Soldiers must identify the dead at morgues near the frontline before they can be taken away
The face of one of the soldiers had been partially ripped off. A morgue official said the injuries had most likely been caused by an artillery shell.
There was no obvious sign of injury on the second soldier. He looked to be in some kind of frozen sleep. The same morgue official said he had been killed by the blast wave from an explosion. Both men died fending off Russian attacks around the area of village of Bilohorivka in Luhansk, where fierce fighting is raging.
Taras bent over the bodies in turn and took a photograph as part of the trail of evidence.
Identity papers are also checked, such as passports and ID cards.
The bags were then zipped up and transferred to the back of his lorry. Then the next two body bags were brought out.
The date on one of those bags – 8 February 1996 – revealed that the soldier it was holding would have been celebrating his 27th birthday. He was found with a military flag from his air assault brigade unit. The flag was folded up neatly, put into a plastic bag and placed on his torso before the body bag was zipped back up.
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A combat medic, who had brought the dead soldiers back from the battlefield, said it was clear that a new Russian offensive had already started.
“You can sense it because the frontline is not far from here. This is audible,” he said.
Asked whether he was seeing a concurrent rise in the number of dead soldiers being collected, he said: “It is not so relevant because we can’t always retrieve them from the battlefield because the aggressor does anything [to stop us]…
“Those bodies brought here do not reveal the true situation. We only bring the bodies that we can pull out. We can bring some out, but not all of them.”
With four bodies in the back of his lorry, Taras moved to a second morgue in the nearby city of Sloviansk. There, 15 bodies were already waiting to be collected, many in black rather than white plastic body bags. Four more then arrived in two military ambulances.
The body collector and other workers methodically processed the majority of the dead, with help from a young woman called Margo who oversaw the morgue.
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She said the number of fallen soldiers passing through varied by day. The highest number in a 24-hour period was 43.
“It does impact me, strongly,” she said, sitting at a small makeshift desk, where she signs off paperwork for each body.
“When I am taking documents and open them and see the date of birth, my tears are welling up from inside me. It is hard to keep myself composed. It is very hard.”
A military paramedic who gave her name as Lina was at this morgue, having helped retrieve some of the fallen from the frontline. She was in a rush to return to her unit.
“In our direction, it is pretty tense,” she said. “My guys are dying at this very moment and they need my help.”
Lina raced off to a waiting vehicle and left.
For Taras, his next stop was the much larger city of Dnipro, about a four-hour drive north. Two more On The Shield drivers, operating in other parts of the eastern frontline, also had collected bodies that morning and were heading in the same direction.
The bodies are transported to the main Dnipro morgue or two other morgues in the vicinity, where the military has established large, refrigerated lorries to be able to handle the volume of death rotating through.
Forensic experts at these facilities examine each body to determine the cause of death. Finally another member of the Shield unit transfers each fallen soldier to their respective families via recruitment centres in their local area anywhere in the country.
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Colonel Vladyslav, 42, the commander of the whole unit, urged the UK and other Western allies to give Ukraine more weapons and ammunition to bolster their capabilities and reduce the number of future losses they incur against Russia.
“The best men die for this war,” he said, speaking in good English, standing outside the Sloviansk morgue.
“We protect our country – that is obvious – but we do not have as many troops as Russia. Therefore, it’s most important to move on to victory as fast as we can.”
Donald Trump has suggested the US could take control of Canada, Greenland and the Panama Canal in a series of Christmas Day social media posts.
The president-elect wished a merry Christmas to all on his Truth Social platform, “including to the wonderful soldiers of China, who are lovingly, but illegally, operating the Panama Canal”.
In the lengthy posts, Mr Trump referred to the American lives lost during the canal’s construction and said the US “puts in billions of dollars in ‘repair’ money, but will have absolutely nothing to say about ‘anything’.”
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He also mocked Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “governor” and again suggested the country could be turned into a US state – following similar comments made in recent weeks.
“If Canada was to become our 51st state, their taxes would be cut by more than 60%, their businesses would immediately double in size, and they would be militarily protected like no other country anywhere in the world,” he wrote.
A cargo ship traverses the Panama Canal in Colon, Panama. Pic: AP
In another post, Mr Trump, 78, said he had encouraged former ice hockey star Wayne Gretzky to run for prime minister but he “had no interest”.
He also addressed “the people of Greenland, which is needed by the United States for national security purposes and, who want the US to be there, and we will!”
It comes after Mr Trump renewed the call he made during his first term in office for the US to buy Greenland from Denmark.
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The world’s largest island, which sits between the Atlantic and Arctic oceans, is 80% covered by an ice sheet and is home to a large US military base. Greenland gained autonomy from Denmark in 1979.
The island’s Prime Minister Mute Egede has insisted Greenland is not for sale.
Mr Trump has also previously threatened to retake control of the Panama Canal, accusing Panama of charging excessive rates to use the crucial trade passage and warning of potential Chinese influence.
Panama’s President Jose Raul Mulino previously said his country’s independence was non-negotiable and that China had no influence on the canal’s administration.
The canal is a critical waterway for world trade, connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and allows ships to avoid lengthy and hazardous journeys around the southernmost tip of South America by cutting through the middle of the Americas.
After the ambitious project was opened in 1914, the canal and surrounding territory were controlled by the US until an agreement with Panama in 1977 paved the way for it to return to full Panamanian control in 1999.
China does not control the canal but a subsidiary of Hong Kong-based CK Hutchison Holdings has long managed two ports at the canal’s Caribbean and Pacific entrances.
World
Syrian equestrian champion tells of 21-year prison ordeal after beating Bashar al Assad’s brother in competition
A Syrian former equestrian champion has told how he was jailed and tortured for 21 years after he beat Bashar al Assad’s older brother in a competition.
Adnan Kassar, once a celebrated figure in the country’s sports scene, spoke to Sky News about his ordeal for the first time following the fall of the Assad family regime‘s more than 50-year rule.
He won multiple gold medals and captained the national equestrian team in the late 1980s, with his career peaking in 1993 at the third International Equestrian Championship in Latakia, where his flawless performance secured victory for the team.
Mr Kassar was a close friend of Bassel al Assad but the achievement apparently drew the ire of his fellow equestrian, who had faltered during the competition.
Bassel was the heir apparent to the Syrian presidency before his death in a car crash in 1994 led to his brother Bashar al Assad‘s return from London, where he worked as an eye doctor, to be trained to take over when his father died.
Adnan Kassar (left) with Bassel al Assad
“The crowd lifted me on their shoulders. It was a moment of pure joy, but for Bassel, it wasn’t the same. That day marked the beginning of my nightmare,” he said.
Shortly after the event, Mr Kassar was arrested over vague accusations, which he said were fabricated as a result of Bassel’s resentment.
He told how his detention turned into a prolonged ordeal marked by brutal interrogations and years of physical and psychological abuse.
“I was kept underground for six months, beaten constantly, and interrogated without end,” he said.
He was then transferred to the notorious Sednaya Prison, dubbed the “human slaughterhouse”, where he said “the torture only got worse”.
Former Syrian President Hafez al Assad, his wife Aniseh, sons Maher, Bashar, Bassel, Majd and daughter Bushra (standing, L-R). Pic: Sana/Reuters
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Mr Kassar said his treatment became even more severe after Bassel died.
“They blamed me for his death,” he said. “Every year on the anniversary of his passing, the torture intensified.”
He was also held for seven-and-a-half years at Tadmur Prison, which is also infamous for its inhumane conditions.
“They pierced my ear one morning and broke my jaw in the evening,” he recalled, saying acts as simple as praying were met with extreme punishment.
“For praying, they lashed me 1,000 times. My feet were torn apart, my bones exposed,” he said.
Many activists repeatedly raised his case following the outbreak of the Syrian revolution, which demanded the end of the Assad family rule.
But despite international appeals, his name was repeatedly excluded from amnesty decrees issued during his imprisonment.
Mr Kassar was finally released on 16 June 2014 after sustained pressure from international groups – nearly 22 years after his arrest.
Until now, he has remained silent about his imprisonment, fearing that any attempt to share his story could result in re-arrest and a return to prison, but has spoken out after Assad was toppled as Syrian president.
“After years of imprisonment, torture, and injustice, the revolution finally toppled the dictatorial regime,” he added.
The Azerbaijan Airlines plane that crashed killing 38 people was downed by a Russian air defence system, according to four Reuters sources.
The Embraer 190 passenger jet was en route from Azerbaijan‘s capital of Baku to the Russian city of Grozny in the North Caucasus on Wednesday when it changed course.
It crashed around two miles from Aktau in Kazakhstan while making an attempt to land after flying east across the Caspian Sea, killing 38 people and injuring all of the other 29 survivors.
The aircraft had diverted from an area of Russia in which Moscow has used air defence systems against Ukrainian drone strikes in recent months.
Mobile phone footage circulating online appeared to show the plane making a steep descent before smashing into the ground in a fireball.
Other footage showed part of its fuselage ripped away from the wings and the rest of the aircraft lying upside in the grass.
People can be heard praying as oxygen masks are lowered in the plane’s cabin in footage filmed by a passenger before the plane went down.
Euronews, citing Azerbaijani government sources, reported a preliminary investigation found a Russian surface-to-air missile was fired at the plane during drone air activity above Grozny.
Shrapnel hit the plane as the missile exploded next to the aircraft mid-flight, according to the network.
The damaged aircraft wasn’t allowed to land at any Russian airports, despite requests from the pilots for an emergency landing, and it was ordered to fly towards Aktau, the sources said.
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Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said earlier on Thursday it would be wrong to speculate before the end of the investigation into the cause of the crash.
Russian, Azerbaijani and Kazakhstani officials have all called for investigations into the crash.
Russia’s civil aviation authority, Rosaviatsia, said preliminary information indicated the pilots diverted to Aktau after a bird strike led to an emergency on board.
Azerbaijan is observing a national day of mourning, with flags lowered across the country on Thursday.
Traffic stopped at noon, and signals were sounded from ships and trains as the country observed a nationwide moment of silence.
Nazakat Asadova, the wife of survivor Zulfugar Asadov, said: “He got up early in the morning, prayed early and left the house at almost six o’clock.
“He said, God willing, at 12 to 1pm, I’ll be landing already. Then we heard on TV that the plane had crashed.
“Then his name came up on TV and on the lists. They said that people died, but Zulfugar Asadov survived.”
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