Every two months, wheelchair-bound pensioner Mykola Ivanovych* needs help to cross the damaged bridge over the Siverskiy Donets River into government-controlled territory so that he can get his government pension. The dividing line lies between his family home in non-government-controlled Luhansk and the government-controlled Stanytsia Luhanska.
Russia's War Against Ukraine
UNHCR: Thousands in eastern Ukraine lose access to pensions
An elderly woman sits outside a damaged building in Pervomaisk, some 50 kms west of Luhansk, on Sept. 28, 2014.
