"We live, not survive" - the story of a resident of Mykolaiv whose business was destroyed by Russia

Tetyana Melnychenko, a resident of Mykolaiv, spoke about the consequences of the shelling of the city with cluster munitions, volunteering, the work of the library under Russian shelling and survival without a centralized supply of drinking water. This is one of the stories recorded by documenters of the Odesa regional organization of the Committee of Voters of Ukraine, who, together with partners, collect evidence of Russian war crimes as part of the global initiative "Tribunal for Putin."

Tetyana Melnychenko is 47 years old and lives in Mykolaiv. She works in a library and also has a small business - a household chemicals store. The war caught her at home in Mykolaiv.

On May 8, our family was hit. On May 8, our shop was damaged. Later we were told that it was an MLRS. The rocket itself fell 150 meters from our store. Our store took the brunt of the impact from cluster shells. Near our store there were refrigerators with ice cream. These fridges were smashed to pieces, all the windows, without exception, were smashed. The goods in the store were damaged. Thank God, no one was hurt, because it was eleven o'clock in the evening and there was a curfew," says Tetiana.

The woman noted that other shops near the store were also damaged, but to a lesser extent. In addition, the windows of the nine-story buildings next door were damaged. Tetiana's business closed after that. Although it hadn't been open before the strike either, because the family had started volunteering.

"From the third day, when we realized that the war would last for a long time, we organized a humanitarian aid headquarters in our library. We helped the military, those who stood at the checkpoints in Shyroka Balka, then the soldiers went further, to ground zero and the first line of defense. We are still helping them. Later, when we gained more connections, we started working with the civilian population. We helped people receive humanitarian aid: food packages, medicine, baby food and hygiene. That is why we work as a humanitarian headquarters. But the library continues to operate in the lending mode - we issue books. Of course, our work in this area has been reduced. But the library is a community center," comments Tetiana.

The woman also spoke about how she survived the water situation when the city was left without water supply. She clarified that help came from Odesa, Vinnytsia, and Chernivtsi. They brought water in trucks.

We wrote an announcement and handed out water to people. Communities from other cities helped us a lot with water. People were not left alone with this problem. We had drinking water," said Tetiana.

She shared that she plans to continue working to help people.

"There are nuances, but they are covered by the fact that we help people, and people who really need it always get help. Even if we don't have something, we communicate with friends from other districts and redirect people there. We give not only a "fish," but also a "fishing rod," says Melnychenko.

As Yulia Lisova, a lawyer and expert at the Odesa Committee of Voters of Ukraine, explains, the Geneva Conventions governing the rules of conduct in military conflicts explicitly prohibit the use of weapons of mass destruction, which are actually cluster munitions.

The publication was prepared by the Odesa regional organization of the Committee of Voters of Ukraine in cooperation with the Mykolaiv Research and Analysis Center as part of the global initiative "Tribunal for Putin".