Chasiv Yar is a city that has been stormed and shelled by occupying forces for months. The invaders continue to relentlessly scorch Chasiv Yar, implementing scorched-earth tactics. For more than two and a half years, Russian troops have been trying at any cost to seize the city of Chasiv Yar in Donetsk Oblast, which became a frontline after the capture of Bakhmut.
Today, the Ukrainian Association of Professional Photographers is publishing images by Kostiantyn and Vlada Liberov, Serhii Korovainyi, Heorhii Ivanchenko, and Yakiv Liashenko. The documentarians captured the war in Chasiv Yar and the lives of its residents on the line of fire at different times since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion. Each photographer managed to preserve a different state of the city in their frames: for some, it is only wounded; others arrived when it was already in ruins.
A convenient staging ground
In June, British intelligence reported that Chasiv Yar is valuable to Russia because of its strategic location on high ground, as well as its use as a logistics hub for Ukraine’s Armed Forces. Chasiv Yar stands on hills that, like defensive walls, protect it from the east and south. The highest point is 247 meters; by comparison, in nearby Kostiantynivka, Druzhkivka, Sloviansk, and Kramatorsk, average elevations range from 100 to 125 meters. Chasiv Yar has become the “gateway” to this agglomeration due to its proximity to Kostiantynivka (7 km to the west) and Kramatorsk (25 km to the northwest).
“Chasiv Yar is a Ukrainian city, and there is every chance we will push the enemy back from there and destroy them in that direction, as has happened before,” said Nazar Voloshyn, spokesperson for the Khortytsia Operational-Strategic Grouping of Troops, during the national telethon broadcast on July 14. Voloshyn explained that “over the past day the enemy also did not abandon attempts to assault and demonstrate its presence in the Chasiv Yar area,” but emphasized that “the defense forces are repelling the attacks and holding on.”
As a reminder, in recent days Chasiv Yar has been closely watched by the media, because on the night of July 3 the DeepState project reported that the Russian army had managed to seize the “Kanal” (Canal) microdistrict in the city. This area is separated from the larger part of the city by the Siverskyi Donets–Donbas canal. Fighting for the microdistrict began back in early April 2024, when the aggressor pushed forward west of Bakhmut.
Of 12,000 residents, just over 600 remain in the city
There are now no intact buildings left there. Because of Russia’s actions, the city that once had 12,000 people has become practically deserted. As of early July 2024, 635 residents remain in Chasiv Yar.
For example, this week none of the local residents expressed a desire to leave the city. This was reported by Serhii Chaus, head of the Chasiv Yar City Military Administration.
“People simply are not leaving the city. Evacuating people has become more dangerous than before, because drone activity is not decreasing. The line of active hostilities is extremely close to the city. Under these conditions, getting into the city to pick someone up is difficult. In addition to people of retirement age, young people also remain in the city—approximately several dozen. In general, we evacuate people to Kramatorsk; most then go to relatives,” Serhii Chaus added.
Another city destroyed by Russia
Documentary images from Chasiv Yar by the photographer couple Kostiantyn and Vlada Liberov have been spreading online in recent days. Frames from this city now resemble the ruins of occupied and destroyed Bakhmut, Avdiivka, and Marinka.
“Chasiv Yar. Russia has come close to the city and turned it into ruins—like everything it touches. According to DeepState maps, as recently as June 27 we drove the enemy out of the city, and already now the Russians have fully occupied the ‘Kanal’ microdistrict—and wiped it off the face of the earth. Despite the fact that the soldiers defending Chasiv Yar are ready to stand to the end, today there is a real threat that we will lose the city,” — Kostiantyn and Vlada shared these alarming thoughts about the situation in the city in early July 2024.
Love in wartime
“It was a pleasant, cozy settlement. Low-rise buildings. An ordinary Donbas town, and it even reminded me of Bakhmut in some ways. Chasik—that’s what we called it,” — that is how photographer Yakiv Liashenko remembered Chasiv Yar.
In April 2023, he witnessed the medical evacuation of soldiers from Bakhmut. Through mud and puddles, an infantry fighting vehicle carrying wounded servicemen arrived in Chasiv Yar. What he saw there struck him.
“It was an evacuation point: they were bringing the wounded from Bakhmut. There was one female medic there. When they unloaded the second serviceman, this woman started shouting, ‘Sasha!’ It turned out to be her husband. She began kissing him and crying. That moment really struck me and stayed in my memory. Later I asked the press officer about what happened to him. Thankfully, the man survived, although he sustained a serious injury,” — Yakiv Liashenko recalls.
An unkept promise
“The streets of Chasiv Yar are the sparse spring greenery of trees and the first flowers, mixed with ruined Soviet-era buildings pocked with shelling holes,” — this is how photojournalist Heorhii Ivanchenko encountered Chasiv Yar in the spring of 2023. While preparing a report for Reporters, his car was damaged by shelling.
In Chasiv Yar, Heorhii met 55-year-old Svitlana and her son, 28-year-old Ihor, who stayed to live at home three kilometers from the front line. Together they went down to the basement level of the building—to the garage—which the family hardly left due to constant incoming strikes. Svitlana also has a 34-year-old daughter who fell ill with lymphoma before the invasion, but the long periods spent in shelters worsened the cancer; now her daughter is undergoing treatment in Donetsk.
“I listen to her and think about this war and peace across the world. War is always very bad. It always means victims and destruction. We promise to return to Svitlana and Ihor with water, food, batteries, and medicine. But when we reached the car we had left in the garage, we saw the garage roof was gone and metal structures had fallen onto the vehicle. The garage had been shelled. Thankfully, the car started and got us to a more or less safe area, where we discovered our fuel tank had also been punctured. Soldiers helped tow us to the next town. We never managed to return to Svitlana and Ihor as we had promised,” — Georhii Ivanchenko said.
“She is sobbing, he is sobbing—explosions in the background”
Photographer Serhii Korovainyi has been to the city many times:
“It’s a very sad place—completely shattered. There are very few civilians there. We would stop by the Points of Invincibility and mostly met only elderly people there. Once we evacuated 80-year-old Ms. Mariia to Kyiv. There was a dramatic scene that really struck me. The woman was saying goodbye to her grandson, who decided to stay in the city. I was carrying her bags and thinking how much grief the Russians have brought to this land. She is sobbing and he is sobbing. Explosions can be heard in the background.”
According to Serhii, among the main dangers in Chasiv Yar are constant FPV-drone strikes.
“Because any vehicle—and especially the press—is a target,” the photographer says.
Serhiy Korovaynyy has been to Chasiv Yar since 2017, as the press previously received accreditation there to work in the ATO/JFO zone.He managed to see the city when it was still relatively peaceful.
"It was a small, quiet town; there were beautiful evenings in the summer. The contrast between Chasiv Yar then and now is two different worlds, like life and death. The front line was completely different then, and no one thought the war would come, despite the fact that it was already ongoing. It hurts me to talk about it. Many cities can become like Chasiv Yar, or have already become so."
The material was created with the support of The Fritt Ord Foundation.
Yakiv Liashenko — a Ukrainian photographer from Kharkiv. He began his professional career in 2012. After the start of the full-scale invasion, he worked as a fixer for well-known photographers and simultaneously documented the events of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. He is currently a freelance photojournalist for EPA Agency. Photographer's Instagram.
Georhiy Ivanchenko — a Ukrainian photographer who has been working as a freelance reporter in the field of documentary and journalistic photography since February 2022. From the first months of the invasion, he began shooting for the Associated Press and the European Pressphoto Agency. Starting with Borodianka, where Heorhiy was born, he continued his journey along the frontline: Mykolaiv, Kharkiv, Kherson regions; now his attention is focused on Donetsk Oblast. A turning point in his photography was spending almost a month in Bakhmut. Throughout December and January, he documented the lives of the city's residents, carrying a backpack and a sleeping bag, sharing everyday life with locals in basements, volunteers, medics, military personnel, and firefighters. In April, while working on a piece about Chasiv Yar in Donbas, his car was shot at and destroyed by a Russian shell. The author now continues his reflection on the numerous situations he encountered and is working on the creation of his first project "Way of War" (working title). Photographer's Instagram.
Kostiantyn and Vlada Liberov — a married couple of photographers from Odesa. They started their journey 4 years ago, focusing initially on creative and emotional love stories. Within a few years, they became some of the most recognizable photographers in the field and moved into active teaching, with thousands of grateful students around the world. At the beginning of the war in Ukraine, they changed the vector of their work, focusing on artistic documentation: their photographs from hot spots in Ukraine go viral on social media, garnering hundreds of thousands of reposts, they are published by influential media outlets such as BBC, Welt, Vogue, Forbes, and are also used on the social media of the President of Ukraine and other high-ranking officials. Couple's Instagram.
Serhiy Korovaynyy — photojournalist and portrait photographer. He collaborates with international publications, including The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Guardian, Financial Times, and others. He shoots his documentary projects, focusing on the Russian-Ukrainian war, ecology, and various aspects of contemporary Ukrainian life. He received his education in the USA in the Master's program in Visual Storytelling as a Fulbright Program scholar. In 2018, he joined The Gate, a leading Ukrainian photo agency. Serhiy's works have been exhibited at numerous personal and collective exhibitions in Ukraine, the USA, and the EU. Photographer's Instagram.
Contributors to the material:Topic researcher, author of the text: Vira Labych
Picture editor: Viacheslav Ratynskyi
Literary editor: Yuliia Futei
