‘These Are Not the Acts of a Country That Seeks Peace’ – Sweden Summons Russian Ambassador as Sumy Buries Its Dead

Sweden said Tuesday it had summoned the Russian ambassador to its foreign ministry to protest against Moscow’s attacks on civilian populations.

“Russia’s responsibility to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure in accordance with international humanitarian law was emphasized to the Russian ambassador during his appearance,” the Swedish foreign ministry said.

Stockholm summoned Russian ambassador Sergey Belyaev, explaining that it had to “to take a clear stance against Russia’s continuous attacks against Ukraine’s cities and civilian population and the serious attacks against the cities of Sumy and Kryvyi Rih in recent weeks,” the ministry’s statement said.

Back-to-back Russian missile strikes on Sunday on the northern city of Sumy killed 35 people and wounded more than 100 others, while an attack on the hometown of President Volodymyr Zelensky of Kryvyi Rih on Friday killed 20 civilians, including nine children.

“These are not the acts of a country that seeks peace,” Swedish Foreign Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard posted on social media. “The Swedish government calls on Russia to immediately withdraw all its troops from Ukrainian territory. The Swedish government wants to see a just and lasting peace in Ukraine and will support Ukraine as long as it takes,” she wrote.

Meanwhile, an AFP reporter on Tuesday visited the memorials of those killed in Sumy, with more than 100 people gathered around the chestnut-colored coffins of a mother and daughter killed in a double Russian missile attack that has unleashed international condemnation.

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Maryna Chudesa, 43, and her mother Lyudmyla Sergiyenko, 64 were killed by a missile on Sunday as they rushed to the scene of an earlier strike to help the wounded.

Holding flowers, friends and relatives formed a circle around a priest giving a eulogy in front of the building where the women lived.

“They died as heroes,” the priest said. They stopped to help the people who were hit by the first missile. The second one took their lives,” he continued.

‘Take me instead’

An AFP reporter, Barbara Wojazer, attended the funeral in Sumy and spoke to the relatives.

“We always went to the sea together, went on fishing trips together, picking mushrooms in the forest together. I don’t know how to live without them,” said Natalya Chudesa, as she struggled to step away from the open casket that contained her daughter.

In the car that carried Maryna’s coffin to the cemetery, Natalya pointed to the spot where the two had stopped their car to rush to help the wounded just 48 hours earlier. “I am proud of them for being such decent people,” she said told the AFP journalist, before crying out: “I wish Maryna stayed with her husband and children and that God had taken me instead.”

‘Can’t take it anymore’

“It is a weekend, a holiday, people are going to church, people are going to pray, to bless willow branches, and it’s the city center,” she added.

At the cemetery, Maryna’s father-in-law Ivan was also struggling to come to terms with her death, AFP reported:

He had known Maryna since she was a girl, as her and his son, Volodymyr, had been childhood friends before falling in love.

“I told her in her coffin ‘I can’t believe it, my old brain can’t comprehend the fact that I won’t see you alive again in my life.’

Then, with heavy heavy tears running down his reddened faced he said: “Close it up guys, I can’t take it anymore.”