Valeriia and Maksym Kovtun left Kreminna, Luhansk Oblast, with their young daughter Sofia. The area where they lived was heavily bombed at the beginning of the war. At first, they moved to their parents’ house in another district, and when the shelling started in March, fatally wounding a neighbour and destroying his house, they decided to flee the city. They found volunteers who transported the family to Dnipro and settled them in a shelter of the “Good on Amur” Charitable Foundation.

After the war is over, the couple would like to return home, but they do not know what will happen to their house. They left a long time ago, and they don’t know if the whole house is still there, as their friends say it was looted by the Russians who had settled there. They hope that someday they will be able to rebuild their own house and make a decent life in it, but it is unknown when this will happen.

In the autumn of 2023, the Kovtuns gave birth to their second daughter, Polina. The whole large family (Valeria, Maksym, their 2 daughters, Valeria’s parents and her sister and brother) live in the shelter of the “Good on Amur” Charitable Foundation.