Summary
More Russian strikes have hit residential buildings in Kyiv. As tower blocks burn, Mayor Vitaly Klitschko has announced a 35-hour curfew, warning of “a difficult and dangerous moment”. Victoria, Gabriel and Vitaly get the latest on the ground and hear from surgeon Dr Andrey Vysotskyi, who has hardly stopped working since we last spoke to him.
Meanwhile, with a Russian journalist facing a fine for interrupting a live TV news bulletin to protest against the war, the BBC Russian Service’s Liza Fokht tells us about her decision to leave Moscow for Latvia.
And we hear from the BBC’s Eastern Europe Correspondent, Sarah Rainsford, on what she’s learned from sheltering with residents in eastern Ukraine while covering the conflict.
Today’s Ukrainecast was made by Daniel Wittenberg with Phil Marzouk, Alix Pickles and Emma Forde. The technical producer was Emma Crowe. The editor is Jonathan Aspinwall.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | BBC sounds, music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:04.8 | Hello, thank you for all your messages which you sent to us from right around the world |
| 0:09.4 | and we read them all. Many of you have been asking about Hessein, his wife, and his three-year-old |
| 0:15.8 | daughter. The last time we spoke to them, they were still in Hefsson, which has been taken over |
| 0:22.4 | by Russian troops. And the last time you heard him on Ukraine cast, he was considering whether |
| 0:29.6 | it was time to leave, whether it was time to get out. |
| 0:32.3 | And as a father, when I see that, I mean, if this becomes a new normal, I'm just ruining |
| 0:38.3 | her childhood. I mean, this was my choice to stay. And if I'm affecting her childhood like that, |
| 0:44.8 | I'm eventually responsible for this. And for me to normalize this, I need to take that |
| 0:49.2 | calculator risk and get out of here. He hasn't tweeted for five days. We've been trying to |
| 0:54.0 | WhatsApp him for five days and had nothing back. I was able to have a conversation with him |
| 0:59.6 | finally last night on Telegram, and he says that I can tell you this. They're all okay. |
| 1:06.3 | They're still at home in Hefsson, and they thank you very much for asking after them. |
| 1:11.4 | And since then, a spokesman for the Russian Defence Ministry says Russian forces |
| 1:15.7 | have taken full control of Ukraine's southern Hessein region, and that is something that the BBC |
| 1:21.9 | hasn't been able to independently verify. That's some point I would like to tell you more about |
| 1:26.4 | the family, and maybe he'll let me do that in coming episodes. |
| 1:30.8 | Vic, I'd just like to read to you a Facebook post by a Russian friend of mine, |
| 1:36.0 | she's a former colleague, and she starts like this, listen, I am not okay, but I'm alive, |
| 1:42.8 | and my child is alive, and my family is safe, no right to complain. But my country's alien to me, |
| 1:49.5 | I read and watch, and I don't believe, I bleed inside, and I haven't processed it. |
| 1:55.5 | People are being killed every minute by my country, for reasons which are beyond my ability |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.

