Kelowna resident worries for friends and family in Ukraine

• Soldier being transported to the east of the country
• Local Ukrainian wants heavier sanctions

UPDATED Feb.24

Russian troops launched their anticipated attack on Ukraine on Thursday, as President Vladimir Putin cast aside international condemnation and sanctions and warned other countries that any attempt to interfere would lead to “consequences you have never seen.”

Big explosions were heard before dawn in Kyiv, Kharkiv and Odesa as world leaders decried the start of an invasion that could cause massive casualties and topple Ukraine’s democratically elected government.

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Recent Russian aggression into Ukraine has caused many Ukrainian Canadians to worry, including the president of Kelowna’s Dolyna Ukrainian Cultural Society.

Peter Bihun said there’s been a recent shift in the mindset of his friends and family living overseas.

“The level of concern has rocketed there, and so now they’re preparing for the worst,” Bihun told Kelowna10. “They could run, or they could fight [and] most of them are choosing to fight. They are forming protection units within cities, arming themselves, training themselves.”

Bihun said he received an email from his cousin living in Lviv, that lots of soldiers from Western Ukraine are being shipped to the east as part of a large transfer of both military equipment and personnel.

This comes after Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree recognizing two regions in eastern Ukraine as independent entities and ordered troops into these regions for “peacekeeping” missions earlier this week.

The move has been seen as the continuation of a Russian invasion of Ukraine that started in 2014. On Tuesday, Canada announced sanctions on Russia in response.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said economic sanctions will ban Canadians from all financial dealings with the regions Putin recognized, Donetsk and Luhansk. The sanctions will also target members of the Russian parliament who voted for the decision to recognize the separatist regions, as well as ban Canadians from engaging in purchases of Russian sovereign debt.

“It’s good that they’ve done some sanctions, but [Putin] has got around sanctions before. This is nothing new to him,” Bihun explained. “They need really a complete shutdown of their financial structure. They need to close the SWIFT [banking] system to them; they need to cut off their money supply.”

Bihun is constantly updating his Facebook page with information regarding the situation, and he participated in a demonstration in Vernon last week to raise awareness.

Recently, funds have been set up by the Ukrainian Canadian Congress to assist with humanitarian efforts.

“I’ll be sending some money this morning directly to the army,” he said. “We have already sent [money] for humanitarian aid for people and hospitals, but I think we need more than that right now.”

Trudeau said Canada is sending up to 460 additional Canadian Armed Forces members to Latvia and the surrounding region to bolster NATO.

- With files from The Canadian Press