KHARKIV, Ukraine: In a Ukrainian city battered by bombs since the start of Russia’s invasion, Natalia Shaposhnik and her daughter Veronika live in a blue and yellow train parked in a metro station deep underground.
For four long weeks, Shaposhnik and hundreds like her have hunkered down inside the station in the north of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city.
With destroyed or heavily damaged buildings on almost every block, the streets were eerily quiet and empty above ground on Thursday.
Down in the station, families crowded together, most of them from the city’s northern outskirts which have suffered near-daily shelling.
Women and children slept side by side on cold concrete floors, or set up home in warmer train carriages divided by curtains into smaller family rooms.
They go out only to walk their dogs or to get a fresh breath of air, a small respite from the dank humidity underground.
“It’s not better than home but it is liveable,” said Shaposhnik, 36, who used to work in a pet shop before the war.
Even underground, the war is ever-present.
On Thursday, a Russian missile hit a metro station two stops away from where Shaposhnik lives with her daughter, killing and wounding several people.
Outside, while a crew cleaned up the shrapnel from the site, a car crammed with wounded Ukrainian soldiers screeched past.
A month on from the start of the invasion, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has cast the war as an existential battle not only for his country but for all of Europe.
Russia refers to the invasion as a “special military operation” and says its forces do not target civilians.
Shaposhnik said she still knew Russians who did not believe that civilians have been shelled, despite the carnage of the past four weeks.
“I wrote to them (that) I’ve been sheltering with my child in the metro for a month and they don’t believe me. They say ‘it is your own fault, you are to blame, it is you, you, you,” she said.
Fearing bombs and war, Kharkiv families spend a month underground
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Fearing bombs and war, Kharkiv families spend a month underground
- With destroyed or heavily damaged buildings on almost every block, the streets were eerily quiet and empty above ground on Thursday
- Women and children slept side by side on cold concrete floors, or set up home in warmer train carriages
Pakistan rules out talks with Afghanistan, says more than 330 Afghan fighters killed in operations
- Pakistan is a major non-NATO ally of Washington, while the US considers the Afghan Taliban a “terrorist” group
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has ruled out talks with Afghanistan until there is an end to “terrorism” emanating from Afghan soil, officials said on Friday. The statement follows the killing of more than 330 Afghan fighters in cross-border skirmishes this week.
The latest clashes between the neighbors erupted after Pakistani airstrikes on Afghan territory last weekend triggered retaliatory attacks along the border on Thursday, escalating long‑simmering tensions over Pakistan’s claim that Afghanistan shelters Pakistani Taliban militants. Afghanistan denies this, saying Pakistan is deflecting blame for its own security failures.
Pakistani Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said his country had killed 331 Afghan fighters, destroyed over 100 posts and targeted 37 military locations across Afghanistan. Afghan officials have said more than 50 Pakistani soldiers have been killed and several Pakistan posts captured. Neither casualty figures nor battlefield claims by either side could be independently verified.
Meanwhile, Mosharraf Zaidi, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s spokesperson for foreign media, ruled out any talks with Afghanistan until Kabul addresses the issue, while the US expressed support for what it called Pakistan’s “right to defend itself” against attacks from Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers.
“There won’t be any talks, there is nothing to talk about ... Terrorism from Afghanistan has to end,” Zaidi told state-run Pakistan TV Digital, saying Islamabad would continue to target militant havens inside Afghanistan.
“Pakistan’s responsibility is to protect its citizens. If we know that there is a terrorist in point A and we know that there is a terrorist enabler at point A, we will find a weapon to land at point A and eliminate the threat.”
Zaidi said he did not expect Pakistan to deviate from this position: “We have clearly articulated what we are doing and what we plan on continuing to do and what it will take for us to stop doing what we are doing.”
He added: “And we will expect that both the international community and the regime in question, the Afghan Taliban, will come to their senses and will help reduce instability and disorder in this region.”
Pakistan is a major non-NATO ally of Washington, while the US considers the Afghan Taliban a “terrorist” group.
“The United States supports Pakistan’s right to defend itself against attacks from the Taliban, a Specially Designated Global Terrorist group,” Reuters quoted a State Department spokesperson as saying.
US diplomat Allison Hooker said on X she had spoken with Pakistan Foreign Secretary Amna Baloch on Friday.
The State Department spokesperson said Washington was aware of the escalation in tensions and “outbreak of fighting between Pakistan and the Afghan Taliban,” adding the US was “saddened by the loss of life.”
“The Taliban have consistently failed to uphold their counterterrorism commitments,” it said. “Terrorist groups use Afghanistan as a launching pad for their heinous attacks.”
Meanwhile, Afghan Taliban spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid called for talks to resolve the crisis.
“We have always emphasized peaceful resolution, and now too we want the issue to be resolved through dialogue,” he said on Friday afternoon.
Asked what Pakistan desired, Tarar said: “Neutralizing the threat and ensuring that Pakistan is safe. Because for us, we’ve been good neighbors, we’ve been very friendly neighbors, we’ve been very, very generous neighbors. Our generosity, unfortunately, has often been seen as our weakness. So the objective, aim is to neutralize the threat and make Pakistan safe.”
He added it was too early to comment on a ceasefire as it was an evolving situation.
