The five-year-old brother of Polina, the Harry Potter mad 10-year-old girl shot dead by the Russians with their parents has also died, it emerged today, in a family tragedy symbolising Putin’s horrific war on the people of Ukraine.
Semyon was in a critical condition in hospital for 72 hours after the family’s car was riddled with bullets as they tried to flee Kyiv as the Russians tried to encircle the capital.
Polina and Semyon were among three members of the same family murdered in their car by one of Putin’s sabotage and reconnaissance units operating in the capital on Saturday.
Vets Anton Kudrin, and wife Svetlana Zapadynskaya, were killed in the car with their middle daughter Polina in a hail of bullets.
Their eldest daughter Sofia and youngest son Semyon were wounded and left in a critical condition in hospital, unaware their family has been killed. The five-year-old boy perished in the Okhmatdyt Children’s Hospital on Wednesday, a relative told the Telegraph.
Sofia, 13, is still in a critical condition in hospital, unconscious and unaware that her entire family has been killed.
A poignant picture of a relative, head bowed, while clutching Semyon’s hand as he lay stricken on a ventilator became a symbol of how Putin’s war is targeting civilians and continues to take a terrible toll on Ukraine‘s youngest and most vulnerable.
And a picture of smiling pink-haired schoolgirl Polina was shared by Vladimir Bondarenko, the deputy mayor of Kyiv on Monday, as she became the face of the chidren who died in the hours and days after the invasion.
Mr Bondarenko said: ‘Her name was Polina. She studied in the 4th grade of school in Kyiv. Her and her parents were shot by Russian DRG.’ The 10-year-old loved the Harry Potter books and was in her final year at primary school when she was murdered.
The brutal treatment suffered at the hands of the Russians by Ukraine’s children has appalled the world as it was also revealed that one child with gunshot wounds died on the way to hospital after his ambulance came under fire from the invaders. Dozens have died and hundreds injured.
Yesterday, among the victims of the indiscriminate shelling was a teenage boy out playing football with his friends. He died before he reached hospital, his father left to weep over his shattered body.
Mariupol – a key Russian target because of its port and location on the Sea of Azov – remained surrounded by Russian troops last night and under a barrage of shellfire which has destroyed properties and cut off power and water supplies.
Hundreds are feared dead in the battle and a local official accused the Russians of wanting to wipe the city off the face of the earth.
Its seizure would allow Russian-backed separatist forces in eastern Ukraine to join forces with soldiers in Crimea – the peninsula forcibly annexed by Russia in 2014.
Families now face food shortages following five days of constant shelling while they have shivered in dark homes, left without electricity and heat.
Fifteen-year-old Iliya was playing football with two friends when they were hit by Russian shelling. David and Artyom, also 15, were found with their legs riddled with shrapnel – and now face the prospect of amputations.
The trio were taken from their makeshift football pitch near a school to the closest hospital but Iliya was dead on arrival, his legs blown apart.
As his father Serhii cradled his blond-haired boy, he wept uncontrollably. ‘My little son,’ he cried.
This week images charting the senseless death of the so-called girl in the pink unicorn pyjamas shocked the world. Surrounded by doctors and nurses, the girl of six lay fatally wounded on a paramedic’s trolley being held by her bloodsoaked father – one of the youngest victims of Putin’s murderous onslaught on her country.
Seven-year-old Alisa Hlans was one of six people who died when her kindergarten was hit on Friday, the second day of the Russian invasion. Pictures of the aftermath of the attack showed bodies strewn around the entrance as the staff tried to flee with the children.
At least one child hiding at the nursery was wounded in the attack.
Prosecutor general Irina Venediktova said Alisa, who was three months away from her eighth birthday, died in hospital on Saturday after the attack in the small town of Okhtyrka, an hour’s drive from Ukraine’s north-east border.
The Russian military were accused of using cluster bombs in the attack, with the shattered kindergarten showing signs of multiple explosions from a single bomb. The Kremlin has denied the claims.
A six-year-old girl called Sofia Fedko and her brother Ivan, who was only a few weeks old, died when five members of the same family came under fire near the southern city of Kherson. The children’s mother Irina and two grandparents, aged 56, also died on the first day of the conflict.
