Visits to Kyiv, Sumy and Chernihiv Region - January 2026

Kent With Ukraine Founder, Jordan Meade, began his first working visit of 2026 in Kyiv. It was intended to be a practical working visit to the capital: meeting partners, strengthening coordination activity, and advancing both the commitments of KWU and UK Friends of Ukraine for the year ahead.

But within hours of arrival, at the Ukrainian Border the purpose of the visit was confronted by a brutal reality that has become routine for millions of Ukrainians. The delegation attempted to make their way from the border to Kyiv via car, however the winter conditions made this an incredibly difficult journey. The drive which in ordinary circumstances would have taken just over 8hrs ended up nearly taking 15 hours, with us getting completely stranded in deep snow on at least two occasions.

As we finally arrived in Kyiv, shattered from the freezing journey, the sky was alight as the air defences kicked in. That night, Kyiv endured one of the most severe attacks on the capital since the full-scale invasion began. It was not simply another air raid siren, another distant thud, another sleepless night. It was an overwhelming, sustained bombardment designed to terrorise civilians and break the resolve of a free society.

According to Ukrainian officials, Russia launched 242 combat drones, 13 Iskander-M and S-400 ballistic missiles, and 22 Kalibr cruise missiles, with Kyiv as the primary target. The scale and intensity of the assault was staggering. Yet what was equally striking was the extraordinary professionalism of Ukraine’s air defenders, who intercepted nearly 250 aerial objects over Kyiv in a single night.

For the delegation, it was an immediate and sobering reminder that Ukraine’s survival is not theoretical, and it is certainly not distant. It is measured in minutes, in intercepts, in warning alerts, in exhausted air defence crews, and in the hard truth that even the most heroic defence cannot stop every strike from landing.

And while the air defence effort was remarkable, the human cost remained horrific.

At least four civilians were killed, with more than twenty injured, and more than 10,000 people were left without electricity and heating as temperatures dropped below –10°C. In the middle of winter, this is no inconvenience. It is life-threatening. It is families trying to keep children warm, elderly residents facing exposure, and hospitals and emergency services fighting to function under impossible conditions. These are the brutal war crimes being inflicted by Russia upon Ukraine, night-after-night and day-after-day. Ukraine’s people face cold, calculated terror, inflicted deliberately and without mercy. It is why Russia’s savagery must not be normalised, and why it must continue to be named for what it is.

Sumy: a region living permanently in Russia’s fire

From Kyiv, Jordan Meade and Stephen Gethins MP travelled onwards to Sumy, a region that sits under constant threat and relentless pressure. While many areas of Ukraine experience the war in waves, Sumy lives in it continuously. It is a place where frontline conditions are not confined to soldiers, but imposed daily on civilians simply trying to exist.

In meetings with the Regional Military Administration, Stephen and Jordan heard about the daily reality facing communities across the region: routine shelling, drone strikes, missile attacks, and the constant fear that comes with living within reach of a hostile border.

Since 2022, officials described how hundreds of civilians have been killed or wounded, entire communities have been displaced, and critical civilian infrastructure has been repeatedly struck. Schools and hospitals have not been spared. Entire neighbourhoods have been torn apart. Vast areas of land have been rendered hazardous, littered with mines and unexploded ordnance, leaving fields, forests, and roadsides deadly long after the strikes themselves.

One of the most difficult moments of the visit came as flowers were laid at the site where a missile killed at least 35 people, including two children. The physical scars of that attack remain visible, but it is the emotional weight carried by local people that is most difficult to witness: grief, exhaustion, and a deep weariness that comes from living under threat without respite.

The purpose of the visit to Sumy was to enable Stephen to officially mark the twinning agreement between Angus in Scotland and Sumy. After formal meetings, it was a real pleasure to witness Stephen proudly handing over beautifully written messages from Primary 5 pupils at Timmergreens Primary School in Arbroath to the Governor of Sumy so that he could remind children in this hard-hit region that they are not forgotten.

The conditions in Sumy remain exceptionally harsh. There is no pause. No safe routine. No certainty of tomorrow.

Chernihiv: strengthening partnerships and advancing reconstruction ambitions

On Sunday, Jordan Meade, took the delegation up to Chernihiv, where Kent With Ukraine has built deep relationships through sustained support since 2023. There, meetings with colleagues and partners at the Regional State Administration and the Regional Development Agency moved beyond immediate crisis response and into the harder, longer work of planning for the future.

These discussions advanced Kent With Ukraine’s commitments to:

• Support the reconstruction of the Chernihiv Regional Youth Centre

• The strengthening of our humanitarian assistance

• the commencement of reconstruction projects, and

• the securing of future regional investment and long-term resilience.

  
  

These are not abstract goals. They are urgent, practical needs in a region still recovering from the devastation of 2022, and still facing significant ongoing attacks today.

Kent With Ukraine’s work is built on the belief that humanitarian support must be combined with long-term rebuilding and community renewal. Chernihiv is not only a region in need of assistance, but a region full of civic strength, capable leadership, and enormous determination to rebuild.

In a moment of warmth amidst the starkness of the visit, Jordan was also pleased to deliver cards and letters from children in Higham to their twin school in Novyi Bilous. These human connections, forged across borders, are a powerful reminder that solidarity is not only expressed in aid deliveries and equipment, but in relationships, compassion, and friendships that endure even in the darkest conditions.

Semenivka: frontline communities under nightly terror

The visit to Chernihiv also included a meeting with Сергій Деденко, the Mayor of Semenivka, a border community that continues to endure sustained Russian aggression. It was a privilege to meet him and hear directly about the situation facing his residents.

Semenivka recently received a vital donation: a fire engine, delivered last month through Kent With Ukraine’s efforts. For communities facing constant attacks, emergency response capacity is not a secondary concern. It can mean the difference between life and death when homes are struck, when fires break out, and when rescue services must operate under the most dangerous conditions imaginable.

But even with practical support and international solidarity, the reality remains harrowing. The Mayor’s testimony painted a picture of border settlements being terrorised night after night, where civilians live under the constant threat of drones, missiles, and shelling.

It is in these places, often overlooked by international attention, that the most relentless pressure of the war is felt.

Yahidne: a crime that cannot be forgotten, and must never be forgiven

One of the most emotionally overwhelming moments of the trip came in the village of Yahidne, where Kent With Ukraine accompanied British colleagues to witness the reality of what took place there in 2022.

Yahidne is not simply a symbol of occupation. It is a case study in inhumanity.

Russian forces rounded up the entire village of 369 people and forced them into a small school basement. There, they were imprisoned in freezing, cramped, and unsanitary conditions for weeks. The suffering was not incidental. It was intentional. It was systematic. It was designed to degrade, to break, and to dehumanise.

Meeting a resident who had been held captive was gut-wrenching. His testimony described neighbours dying underground. It described boys being used as human shields and as target practice. It described more than 300 people forced to use buckets as toilets for weeks on end.

And it was not only adults. There were babies just months old. Children. Elderly people. Entire families locked underground in darkness, filth, and fear.

For those present, the scale and extremity of the war crimes committed in Yahidne could only be likened to the worst atrocities of the Holocaust. This is not rhetoric. This is the language required when the facts themselves are beyond comprehension.

There must be accountability and reckoning for those responsible. There must be justice for the victims. And there must be no moral ambiguity, no hesitation, and no retreat into comfortable euphemisms that soften what happened.

Transfiguration Cathedral in Chernihiv

It was also a profound honour for Kent With Ukraine to return once again to the Transfiguration Cathedral in Chernihiv, one of the oldest surviving stone cathedrals in Eastern Europe. Standing within its ancient walls, it is impossible not to be struck by the timeworn grandeur and the sacred stillness of the space, and by the immense importance of this cathedral to Ukraine’s spiritual life and national heritage.

Local tradition even suggests that the foundation stone of the cathedral may have been laid before that of St Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv, which would make it the oldest cathedral of the Kyivan Rus’. What however is beyond dispute, is that Chernihiv’s Transfiguration Cathedral was already standing for around a century before Moscow is even first mentioned in 1147, a powerful reminder that Ukraine’s history, culture, and statehood run far deeper than the imperial myths Russia continues to weaponise today.

Chernihiv Regional Youth Centre - KWU reconfirms support

We also visited the bombed-out site of the Chernihiv Regional Youth Centre, a place that should be filled with learning, creativity, laughter, and opportunity, but which now stands as yet another stark reminder of Russia’s deliberate targeting of civilian life.

Walking through the shattered remains of what was once a vital hub for young people across the region was deeply sobering, not only because of the scale of destruction, but because of what it represents: an attack on Ukraine’s future as much as its present. Yet Kent With Ukraine used this moment not only to bear witness, but to recommit our ambition to support the restoration of the Youth Centre, so that it can once again serve the young people of Chernihiv as a safe, modern, and inspiring space for education, wellbeing, and community resilience.

Winter in Ukraine: freezing not only from cold, but from cruelty

As the visit progressed, the physical reality of Ukraine’s winter deepened. During the trip, temperatures in Chernihiv fell below –25°C. In such conditions, heat and electricity become essential to survival. Yet Russia continues to deliberately target homes, power stations, heating networks, and civilian infrastructure.

People in Ukraine are literally freezing. Not simply because of the weather, but because of the wicked Russian war strategy designed to weaponise winter itself.

It is exhausting to witness, even over a short visit. But Ukrainians are not passing through this nightmare; they are living it every hour of every day. It is a relentless assault on normal life, where the simplest acts, keeping warm, boiling water, charging a phone, become daily struggles.

And yet Ukraine endures. And Ukraine will endure.

“2026 must be the year we maximise our efforts”

Jordan Meade left Ukraine heartbroken by what friends and partners are enduring as Putin’s terrorist regime continues to rain death on cities and villages in the depths of winter. But he also left with renewed clarity and determination.

Kent With Ukraine is committed that 2026 will be the year the organisation deepens its support, expands its impact, advances reconstruction ambitions, and calls out Russian barbarism without hesitation or apology.

Because Ukraine’s suffering is not inevitable. It is inflicted. And Ukraine’s survival is not guaranteed. It must be defended, resourced, and supported with urgency equal to the scale of the crisis.

Kent With Ukraine also extends its sincere thanks to everyone in Ukraine who facilitated this visit, and to the extraordinarily brave heroes, in the armed forces, emergency services, local government, and civil society, who continue to hold the frontline of peace and security for us all.