MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
Thousands of Ukrainians have spent much of the last four years of war in a Russian prison, cut off from the outside world. Their families often have no idea what they're going through or even if they're alive. Here's NPR's Joanna Kakissis with another report about the cost of war in one city in the south, Kherson.
JOANNA KAKISSIS, BYLINE: When the Russians took over Kherson four years ago, they patrolled the streets looking for locals resisting the occupation. That's how the city's former mayor, Volodymyr Mykolaienko, ended up in the trunk of a car with a sack over his head. He was supposed to meet someone.
VOLODYMYR MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) When I arrived at the meeting point, a car drove up at a high speed, and a Russian soldier jumped out. He grabbed me, turned my face to the car and asked, is that him?
KAKISSIS: He ended up in a basement jail with others he knew. It was a week before Easter.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) They beat me practically every day. They did not beat me on Easter Sunday, but instead, they beat me twice on Good Friday. They even broke my ribs.
KAKISSIS: He was soon moved to other prisons and ended up in Russia. His fellow POWs included a sunflower farmer and a handyman snatched from the forest while gathering firewood, as well as captured Ukrainian soldiers.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) They brought a guy on crutches. He had no legs. Other guys were also severely wounded. Some were even losing their minds.
KAKISSIS: He and the other POWs ate potato peelings and cups of murky soup.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) I remember once I counted seven grains of barley in my soup, and all the other guys were jealous. They said, you're so lucky.
KAKISSIS: Mykolaienko dug up wild nettles growing in the cracks of the prison courtyard.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) We divided the leaves among us, sharing two, maybe three leaves each, so we could at least have some vitamins.
KAKISSIS: They also shared stories about their families. Mykolaienko talked a lot about his elderly mother. He wondered if she was still alive, and if she was, he thought, does she think I'm dead? He often wondered if he would die here. Long interrogations by Russian soldiers often came with more beatings. He says his interrogators told him they were fighting to restore the Soviet Union.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) And they believed they were fighting not with Ukraine, but it was the whole world, that the whole world was against them.
KAKISSIS: He often pressed them for news about his hometown. And in spring of 2023, an interrogator let it slip out that Ukraine had regained control of Kherson.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) And this made me feel less trapped. This gave me hope that Ukraine would soon be free, and this madness started by the Russians would end.
KAKISSIS: Two more years passed before Mykolaienko's own ordeal would end. On August 20 of last year, he was moved to a new cell, where, rumor had it, prisoners went before being released.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) Well, that's what we guessed because we saw people go in and then disappear. We called it the portal.
KAKISSIS: Three days after entering the portal, he and other POWs were loaded into a van and driven to an airfield.
(SOUNDBITE OF SIRENS)
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: Whoo-hoo-hoo. Whoo-hoo.
KAKISSIS: They arrived back home on August 24, Ukraine's Independence Day.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Speaking Ukrainian).
KAKISSIS: TV crews filmed their return.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Speaking Ukrainian).
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: (Speaking Ukrainian).
KAKISSIS: Mykolaienko had lost more than 50 pounds in captivity. His head was shaved. His face was pale and gaunt. But he was smiling. He wrapped himself in the blue-and-yellow Ukrainian flag. A Ukrainian journalist recorded Mykolaienko's message to his hometown.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) Congratulations to Kherson, and happy holidays, my dear. Happy Independence Day.
KAKISSIS: Ukrainian authorities gave him a cellphone so he could call his wife and daughters, who told him his elderly mother was alive. But there was bad news about the hometown he had not seen since April 2022.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) They told me that Kherson is almost destroyed, and every day the Russians are using drones to hunt down civilians.
KAKISSIS: For the next few weeks, Mykolaienko recovered in a hospital in Kyiv. And then last fall, doctors gave him the all-clear to go home. On the bus ride to Kherson, he passed highways covered in tunnels of nets put up to protect the city from drones, something he had not even imagined during his 3 1/2 years in a Russian prison.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) I mean, I remember defending my city with a rifle. And now, there are killer robots that fly.
KAKISSIS: When he arrived in Kherson, it looked so empty. Its pre-war population of 300,000 had shrunk to just 60,000. He passed what seemed like hundreds of destroyed buildings.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) The pain was immense. I had not fully recovered from my captivity. And to see this horror, it was so very difficult.
KAKISSIS: A United Nations study says short-range Russian drones have killed at least 200 civilians and injured 2,000 more in Kherson and surrounding areas since 2024. The U.N. calls these attacks war crimes.
Mykolaienko says he will stay in Kherson with his family and grandchildren and help it heal. He strolls through his neighborhood and sees signs of life.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) Oh, I think there are more people outside, maybe because it's getting warmer.
KAKISSIS: Or maybe, he says, it's just him, the optimist. Because Russian troops continue to hunt civilians here using short-range drones, Mykolaienko compares it to living in a jungle, hunted by wild animals.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) Every day is a challenge. Will you stay alive or not?
KAKISSIS: His daughter gave him a portable drone detector for protection, but sometimes he forgets about what he calls the flying killer robots. Like one day a few weeks ago, when he was shoveling snow on the sidewalk just outside his house.
MYKOLAIENKO: (Through interpreter) And then, two police officers passed by. They yelled, hey, man, hurry up and take cover. Can't you hear? There is a drone flying over you. And I look up and I see it circling over my head.
KAKISSIS: He walked inside and watched the killer robot fly away. Then he went back outside and finished shoveling.
Joanna Kakissis, NPR News.
(SOUNDBITE OF KARATE'S "WAKE UP, DECIDE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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