{"id":41873,"date":"2022-03-04T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-03-04T19:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-immigrants-condemn-war-but-disagree-on-events-leading-up-to-russia-ukraine-conflict\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:03:56","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:03:56","slug":"durango-immigrants-condemn-war-but-disagree-on-events-leading-up-to-russia-ukraine-conflict","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/durango-immigrants-condemn-war-but-disagree-on-events-leading-up-to-russia-ukraine-conflict\/","title":{"rendered":"Durango immigrants condemn war but disagree on events leading up to Russia-Ukraine conflict"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Roman
Roman Bohachevsky, who was born in Ukraine and has returned several times \u2013 once at the behest of the U.S. Library of Congress to help the country form its own congressional library after the collapse of the Soviet Union \u2013 gives his thoughts about the Russian invasion of the county on Wednesday. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Durango resident Roman Bohachevsky recalls arriving 72 years ago to a shipping port in New York City. He was only 8 at the time. His family had fled Ukraine shortly after his birth in 1942, and they planned to make a new start in America.<\/p>\n

When Bohachevsky and his family stepped off the ship, he believed the past was behind him. But in recent days with the invasion of Ukraine, Bohachevsky\u2019s past has come back to haunt him.<\/p>\n

Bohachevsky believes Russian President Vladimir Putin is intent on taking the country \u201cback\u201d for Russia.<\/p>\n

The war, he said, is \u201cheartbreaking.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe fled the Russians once. And here I am, I\u2019m 80 years old, and the Russians are a menace again,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Bohachevsky said he feels saddened and helpless.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t even go back and throw Molotov cocktails, because I\u2019m too old,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m just frustrated. It\u2019s terrible. These are very good people.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Bohachevsky left Ukraine, it wasn\u2019t for good. He returned in 1994, about three years after the collapse of the Soviet Union. He was sent by the U.S. Library of Congress to help the newly independent Ukraine establish a congressional library of its own where members of parliament had all the information they needed for state decision-making.<\/p>\n

He was there for one week. Before sessions with delegates, he would walk and jog through Kyiv. He talked casually with taxi drivers and hotel staff members, and he remembers feeling a kinship with the people of Ukraine. He said even though all his Ukrainian relatives are dead today, he considers the people to be his brothers.<\/p>\n

And he is devastated to see Ukraine\u2019s work over the last three decades at building an independent democracy \u2013 work he contributed to, in his small way \u2013 in danger of toppling at the hands of Russia.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve been coming along; they\u2019ve been corrupt, they\u2019ve had all kinds of issues,\u201d Bohachevsky said. \u201cBut they are starting to make it. And here this comes (war with Russia). It\u2019s unbelievable. I don\u2019t believe it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bohachevsky said Putin doesn\u2019t consider Ukraine to be its own country, and he suspects the Russian president wants to reunite the territories that made up the Soviet Union. Putin acts like a czar, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think he really sees himself as a really powerful man,\u201d he said. \u201cI think he wants to restore greatness. I don\u2019t want to make any comparisons about \u2018making America great again,\u2019 but he is a populist.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Russians have always been a menace from Bohachevsky\u2019s point of view. But not everyone thinks Putin\u2019s cause is malicious.<\/p>\n

\"Ukraine,
Ukraine, including the regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, disputed by Russia. (Creative Commons)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Durangoan Svetlana Koshevaya, an American citizen from Lithuania who self-identifies as ethnically Russian, said Putin is furthering efforts to support people who want independence from Ukraine. She said she supports Putin\u2019s actions in Ukraine and doesn\u2019t consider the developing conflict in Ukraine an invasion.<\/p>\n

Other Durangoans with ties to Russia and Eastern Europe shared similar sentiments in an interview Saturday with The Durango Herald<\/em>. They, too, support the separatist regions of Luhansk and Donetsk and see the war as a progression of those conflicts that erupted about eight years ago.<\/p>\n

Ekaterina Woodard repeated Kremlin talking points that Russians aren\u2019t attacking civilians. It is actually Ukrainian Nazis who are killing their own people, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBasically, Western and Eastern Ukraine is what the conflict is,\u201d she said. \u201cNazis, they came from Western Ukraine. They are killing their own people and making it look like Russians are doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Elena
Elena Frank of Durango talks with The Durango Herald on Saturday about her perspective on the Russia-Ukraine war. She believes Kremlin talking points that Russian President Vladimir Putin is on a mission to \u201cdemilitarize\u201d Ukraine, and that he has no intent to harm civilians. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Elena Frank, who used to live in Kyiv and has family in Luhansk, also said that Nazi or neo-Nazi forces are behind the violence in Ukraine as well as Luhansk and Donetsk. She said Ukrainian nationalists aim to criminalize the Russian language and allow only Ukrainian to be spoken.<\/p>\n

In 2019, Ukraine passed a law making Ukrainian the nation\u2019s official state language. The law made it mandatory for public officials, teachers and doctors to speak Ukrainian, but the law does not ban the Russian language, either.<\/p>\n

The law was passed by former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, who was succeeded by current President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who speaks Russian and Ukrainian.<\/p>\n

Irina Hermesman was born and raised in Siberia, Russia. She has lived in Durango for the last 23 years. Her stepmother lives in Ukraine. Over the last several years, she has worked with Russian adoptees to connect them with their biological families in Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and other former USSR countries, she said.<\/p>\n

Like Bohachevsky, Hermesman is saddened by the conflict between Ukraine and Russia. She was planning to visit another family in Russia in April, but now she doesn\u2019t expect the trip to be feasible.<\/p>\n

\"Ekaterina
Ekaterina Woodard, left, Elena Frank, center, and Irina Hermesman, all of Durango, speak on Saturday about their perspective on the Russia-Ukraine war. They are sympathetic to the separatist regions of Donetsk and Luhansk and support Russian President Vladimir Putin\u2019s advances into Ukraine, but they said they are opposed to war and want the violence to end. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

\u201cEverybody will be affected by this conflict,\u201d she said. \u201cEverybody. People in Ukraine hurt. People in Russia are going to be hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her biggest fear is she might not ever see her family in Russia again, she said. She is also worried how sanctions against Russia for starting the conflict will affect Russia\u2019s people. Her family is afraid, but they, too, support Donetsk\u2019s and Luhansk\u2019s separation from Ukraine.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t want conflict and we are deeply hurt by what\u2019s going on in the countries,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

She wishes warring Russians and Ukrainians would go home and that leaders \u201cwould find courage and wisdom\u201d to sit down together and peacefully work things out.<\/p>\n

Bohachevsky said the root of claims about Nazis tearing Ukraine apart from within lie with World War II. Western Ukraine has long held a nationalist yearning to become its own country. The people sided with Germans during their occupation of Western Ukraine because they hoped the Germans would help them create a free Ukraine, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey were never Nazis,\u201d Bohachevsky said. \u201cThey were opportunists.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Eastern Ukrainians have always looked at their western neighbors with some suspicion, he said.<\/p>\n

Bohachevsky said he understands how people might be susceptible to Russian claims of \u201cdenazification,\u201d as unfounded as they may be \u2013 but he draws the line at war and said the invasion is unjustifiable.<\/p>\n

He said he expects the people of Ukraine to fight until the last man dies. He is grateful for support shown by people across the world, but he fears for the future of his people.<\/p>\n

cburney@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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