LVIV: The small band of soldiers gather outside to share cigarettes and war stories, sometimes casually and sometimes with a degree of testiness over recollections made unreliable by their last day fighting, the day the war took away their limbs.
Some clearly remember the moment they were hit by anti-tank mines, aerial bombs, a missile, a shell. For others, the gaps in their memories loom large.
Vitaliy Bilyak’s skinny body is a web of scars that end with an amputation above the knee. During six weeks in a coma, Bilyak underwent over 10 surgeries, including his jaw, hand, and heel, to recover from injuries he received April 22 driving over a pair of anti-tank mines.
“When I woke up, I felt like I was born again and returned from the afterlife,” said Bilyak, who is just beginning his path to rehabilitation. He does not yet know when he’ll receive a prosthesis, which must be fitted individually to each patient.
Ukraine is facing a future with upward of 20,000 amputees, many of them soldiers who are also suffering psychological trauma from their time at the front. Europe has experienced nothing like it since World War I, and the United States not since the Civil War.
Mykhailo Yurchuk, a paratrooper, was wounded in the first weeks of the war near the city of Izium. His comrades loaded him onto a ladder and walked for an hour to safety. All he could think about at the time, he said, was ending it all with a grenade. A medic refused to leave his side and held his hand the entire time as he fell unconscious.
When he awoke in an intensive care unit the medic was still there.
“Thank you for holding my hand,” Yurchuk told him.
“Well, I was afraid you’d pull the pin,” the medic replied. Yurchuk’s left arm was gone below the elbow and his right leg above the knee.
In the 18 months since, Yurchuk has regained his equilibrium, both mentally and physically. He met the woman who would become his wife at the rehabilitation hospital, where she was a volunteer. And he now cradles their infant daughter and takes her for walks without the slightest hesitation. His new hand and leg are in stark black.
Yurchuk has himself become the chief motivator for new arrivals from the front, pushing them as they heal from their wounds and teaching them as they learn to live and move with their new disabilities. That kind of connection will need to be replicated across Ukraine, formally and informally, for thousands of amputees.
“Their whole locomotive system has to be reoriented. They have a whole redistribution of weight. That’s a really complicated adjustment to make and it needs to be made with another human being,” said Dr. Emily Mayhew, a medical historian at Imperial College who specializes in blast injuries.
There are not nearly enough prosthetic specialists in Ukraine to handle the growing need, said Olha Rudneva, the head of the Superhumans center for rehabilitating Ukrainian military amputees. Before the war, she said, only five people in all of Ukraine had formal rehabilitation training for people with arm or hand amputations, which in normal circumstances are less common than legs and feet as those sometimes are amputated due to complications with diabetes or other illnesses.
Rudneva estimated that 20,000 Ukrainians have endured at least one amputation since the war began. The government does not say how many of those are soldiers, but blast injuries are among the most common in a war with a long front line.
Rehabilitation centers Unbroken and Superhumans provide prostheses for Ukrainian soldiers with funds provided by donor countries, charity organizations and private Ukrainian companies.
“Some donors are not willing to provide military aid to Ukraine but are willing to fund humanitarian projects,” said Rudneva.
Some of the men undergoing rehabilitation regret they’re now out of the war, including Yurchuk and Valentyn Lytvynchuk.
Lytvynchuk, a former battalion commander, draws strength from his family, especially his 4-year-old daughter who etched a unicorn on his prosthetic leg.
He headed recently to a military training ground to see what he could still do.
“I realized it’s unrealistic. I can jump into a trench, but I need four-wheel drive to get out of it. And when I move ‘fast’ a child could catch me,” he said. Then, after a moment, he added: “Plus, the prosthesis falls off.”
The hardest part for many amputees is learning to live with the pain — pain from the prosthesis, pain from the injury itself, pain from the lingering effects of the blast shockwave, said Mayhew, who has spoken with several hundred military amputees over the course of her career. Many are dealing with disfigurement and the ensuing cosmetic surgeries.
“That comorbidity of PTSD and blast injury and pain — those are very difficult to unpick,” she said. “When people have a physical injury and they have a psychological injury that goes with it, those things can never be separated. ”
For the severely injured, rehabilitation could take longer than the war ultimately lasts.
The cosmetic surgeries are crucial to allowing the soldiers to feel comfortable in society. Many are so disfigured that it’s all they believe anyone sees in them.
“We don’t have a year, two,” said Dr. Natalia Komashko, a facial surgeon. “We need to do this as if it was due yesterday.”.
Bilyak, the soldier who drove over anti-tank mines, still sometimes finds himself dreaming of battle.
“I’m lying alone in the ward on the bed, and people I don’t know come to me. I realize they’re Russians and they start shooting me point-blank in the head with pistols, rifles,” he recounted. “They start getting nervous because they’re running out of bullets, and I’m alive, I show them the middle finger and laugh at them.”
Upward of 20,000 Ukrainian amputees face trauma on a scale unseen since WWI
https://arab.news/n44xt
Upward of 20,000 Ukrainian amputees face trauma on a scale unseen since WWI

- The hardest part for many amputees is learning to live with the pain — pain from the prosthesis, pain from the injury itself, pain from the lingering effects of the blast shockwave
- Rudneva estimated that 20,000 Ukrainians have endured at least one amputation since the war began
Uganda’s president arrives in S.Sudan as crisis deepens

- The Ugandan leader, whose military was invited into South Sudan last month to help secure the capital, did not refer directly to the crisis in public remarks at the airport in Juba
NAIROBI: Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni arrived in neighboring South Sudan on Thursday, in the highest level mission there since clashes and the detention of the vice president triggered regional fears of a return to civil war.
Museveni was met at the airport by South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir, whose administration has accused First Vice President Riek Machar of stoking rebellion and put him under house arrest.
The Ugandan leader, whose military was invited into South Sudan last month to help secure the capital, did not refer directly to the crisis in public remarks at the airport in Juba.
The visit follows mediation missions by the African Union and an East African regional body this week to de-escalate the crisis.
Museveni told reporters he would hold talks “aimed at strengthening bilateral relations and enhancing cooperation between our two nations.”
Kiir said the two leaders would discuss “current political developments in the country.”
The standoff between Kiir and Machar, who led opposing forces in a 2013-2018 civil war that killed hundreds of thousands, has prompted the UN to warn that the world’s young nation could be on the brink of all-out conflict along ethnic lines.
Uganda backed Kiir’s forces during the civil war.
It sent troops last month amid fighting between South Sudan’s military and an ethnic Nuer militia in Upper Nile state in the northeast.
Machar’s predominantly Nuer forces were allied with the White Army militia during the civil war, but his party denies government accusations of ongoing links.
Uganda’s military chief, Muhoozi Kainerugaba, also Museveni’s son, said on Tuesday he had ordered Ugandan forces to stop attacking the White Army so long as it ceases offensives against Ugandan troops.
Machar’s party says the Ugandan intervention violates South Sudan’s arms embargo.
Analysts say Kiir, 73, appears to be attempting to shore up his position amid discontent within his political camp and speculation about his succession plan.
Italy plans $22 million for migrant repatriations

- The ministry said the plan would benefit “around 3,300 of the most vulnerable migrants, carrying out their repatriation to their countries of origin sustainably and effectively”
ROME: Italy plans to invest 20 million euros ($22 million) in a new project to help Algeria, Libya, and Tunisia send irregular migrants from their territories back to the migrants’ countries of origin.
The government of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has vowed to cut irregular migration to Italy’s shores from North Africa — the majority of whom depart from Libya and Tunisia.
However, many migrants who depart hail from other countries, especially sub-Saharan African countries.
Italy’s new plan “focuses on strengthening the institutional and administrative-managerial capacities of the partner countries,” with the involvement of 400 officials, Italy’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Irregular migration would be better addressed “through the improvement and development of assisted voluntary repatriations from Algeria, Libya and Tunisia to the countries of origin,” it said.
It said the project would collaborate with the International Organization for Migration to ensure migrants’ rights.
The ministry said the plan would benefit “around 3,300 of the most vulnerable migrants, carrying out their repatriation to their countries of origin sustainably and effectively.”
It said Italy’s Agency for Development Cooperation, which helps carry out development activities, would provide technical support.
The agency has also been charged with another plan targeted at the “socio-economic reintegration of returning migrants,” tapping Italian companies and civil society groups, it said.
Most migrants arriving in Italy via the Mediterranean depart from Libya and Tunisia.
Italy has agreements with both countries to provide funding in exchange for help stemming departures.
On Wednesday, Libyan authorities said they would suspend the work of 10 international humanitarian groups, including Doctors Without Borders, accusing them of a plan to “settle migrants” from other parts of Africa in the country.
Driver of car in Amsterdam explosion may have been attempting suicide, police say

- Police arrested the man, a 50-year old Dutchman, on suspicion of arson
- Nobody was hurt in the incident except the suspect
AMSTERDAM: Dutch police said they believed the driver of a car that caught fire on Thursday following an explosion in central Amsterdam may have been attempting to commit suicide.
Police arrested the man, a 50-year old Dutchman, on suspicion of arson. Nobody was hurt in the incident except the suspect.
“Police detectives are keeping all scenarios open but have strong suspicions that the man wanted to take his own life,” police said on the social media platform X.
Earlier, police said camera footage had shown the fire was caused by an explosion, which happened among a crowd of people on Amsterdam’s busy Dam Square.
Images on social media show a man with burning clothes close to a small red car with flames billowing from its windows.
Police are seen extinguishing the flames on the man before taking him into custody.
Police sealed off the square while explosives experts investigated the vehicle. It was later removed from the square.
Last week, a man injured five people near Dam Square in a stabbing rampage. Police identified the suspect in that incident as a 30-year-old Ukrainian national from the eastern Donetsk region, who prosecutors said had acted with terrorist intent.
University of Birmingham students facing disciplinary hearing over pro-Palestine activism

- Student Antonia Listrat: ‘Funding genocide is violent; protesting genocide is peaceful’
- Legal rights group sounds alarm over ‘nationwide crackdown’ on solidarity with Palestinians
LONDON: Two pro-Palestine students at the UK’s University of Birmingham are facing disciplinary proceedings over their activism, with a major legal rights group sounding the alarm over a “nationwide crackdown” on solidarity with the Palestinian people.
The European Legal Support Centre submitted legal documents to the university’s misconduct panel on behalf of the two students, Mariyah Ali and Antonia Listrat.
Amid the war in Gaza and sweeping pro-Palestine solidarity at institutions across the UK, the two students had demanded that their university divest from arms companies supplying the Israeli military.
Ali and Listrat face a disciplinary hearing on April 7, with the ELSC urging the university to dismiss the proceedings.
Coventry MP Zarah Sultana labeled the university’s move “an assault on democratic rights,” while the decision was questioned by UN Special Rapporteur Gina Romero, who highlighted “harassment, intimidation and reprisals” against the students at the university.
The pair have been supported by the university’s student body, which elected Listrat as guild president and Ali as ethnic minorities officer.
Ali said: “The disciplinary process against Antonia and me is a blatant attempt to suppress dissent and silence the wider student movement.
“This authoritarian crackdown is not just an attack on our right to protest — it is a display of institutional Islamophobia and bureaucratic repression.
“The student movement for Palestine is stronger than ever. Instead of charging students, the University of Birmingham must focus on divesting from companies complicit in genocide and war crimes.”
The student union also passed a motion supporting pro-Palestine solidarity that was subsequently blocked by union trustees.
By taking punitive measures against the students, the university is “contradicting the democratic will of students,” the ELSC said.
Anna Ost, the center’s senior legal officer, added: “We are deeply concerned that the university’s intention and effect in targeting these two students is to dissuade the wider university community from speaking out for Palestine.
“The university needs to change its approach, drop the disciplinaries, and demonstrate that fundamental freedoms are still promoted on its campus.”
The targeting of the students is part a wider crackdown on pro-Palestine activism across the UK in the wake of Israel’s war in Gaza.
Since October 2023, at least 28 universities across the UK have disciplined more than 113 students for activism, a joint investigation by Sky News and Liberty Investigates found.
The ELSC warned that the campus crackdowns, which have involved police and private security, is creating a “chilling effect” that “sets a dangerous precedent for campus democracy.”
British universities are legally bound to protect freedom of expression under the education and human rights acts, it added, warning that the University of Birmingham is “violating these obligations by penalizing students for their political beliefs.”
The center called on the university to dismiss the charges against the students and uphold freedom of speech, expression and assembly on campus.
Listrat said protesting is “an integral part of campus life” that signifies a “healthy and progressive society.”
She added: “As far-right rhetoric rises throughout the world, we need to make a huge effort to protect our rights and uphold international law and morality.
“Enabling genocide and profiting from human rights violations is quite a violent stance that the University of Birmingham has taken. Funding genocide is violent; protesting genocide is peaceful.”
German military to order exploding drones for first time, sources say

- Russia and Ukraine have fielded such single-use drones
- The procurement of armed drones has been controversial in Germany
BERLIN: The German military will be armed with loitering munitions, or exploding drones, for the first time, two defense ministry sources said on Thursday, as Berlin tries to catch up with a technology that has shown its destructive power in Ukraine.
Both Russia and Ukraine have fielded such single-use drones, which cruise toward their target before plummeting at velocity and detonating on impact.
But the procurement of armed drones has been controversial in Germany, with some politicians associating them with targeted extrajudicial killings by US forces in Afghanistan.
It took years of heated debate before parliament agreed in 2022 to enable a large drone such as the Heron TP, which flies at much higher altitudes, to carry arms.
However, military upgrades are more urgent now for Germany, amid the continuing war between Russia and Ukraine and doubts about the future of US military protection.
Last month, parliament approved plans for a defense spending surge worth hundreds of billions of euros.
Contracts with two companies for a first batch of exploding drones will be signed in the coming days, the sources said, declining to name the companies. The army, air force and navy will test them in the following months.
“The use of drones and the defense against drones is crucial for the survival of our troops on the modern battlefield, that’s something we learned in Ukraine,” said one of the sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
“Each soldier must be capable of operating drones, just as today, everybody knows how to use binoculars.”
Germany will aim to sign longer-term contracts by the end of the year for a larger number of drones, shortening the period for introducing new weapons which usually takes years.
As drone technology evolves rapidly, the deals will specify that companies supply a limited number initially for training purposes, and that they may be asked later to supply a larger number of the latest models at short notice, if needed.
“There’s no use in purchasing thousands of drones ... only to realize they are outdated by the time we need them,” one of the sources said.