Death And Doubt Haunt Easter In War-scarred East Ukraine

Lyudmila Gaidai celebrated Easter last year with her children around her kitchen table, but Russian forces have shelled her town in east Ukraine so heavily, the church closed this year and everyone fled.

In her cluttered and darkened kitchen -- its blown-out windows covered by fluttering plastic sheets -- the 80-year-old had nonetheless set out a small traditional Easter cake.

"I wish everything would end and we could have a real Easter. To end all this, all these explosions, this war," the 80-year-old said, the pitch of her voice rising as tears welled up.

"Only God knows when it will," she told AFP journalists, each sentence punctuated by dull thuds of outgoing and incoming artillery around her neighbourhood in Chasiv Yar.

Celebrations this year for Easter -- the most sacred holiday on the Orthodox calendar -- point to the toll of Russia's grinding invasion on believers in the war-scarred Donetsk region.

Outside a small church in Sloviansk, a town dotted with signs of conflict, Ukrainian soldiers laid out wicker baskets of sausages and decorated eggs, and held candles as they waited to be blessed.

Rescue workers nearby were still digging for civilians buried after a Russian missile barrage killed a dozen residents in a Soviet-era apartment bloc.

Air raid sirens were wailing as around two dozen men and women in uniform gathered in a row while the priest doused them in holy water and elderly women shuffled behind him singing hymns in harmony.

"The shelling was so intense that a candle fell out of my hand. We picked it up and continued to pray," said Father Mykola, recounting the attack two days earlier.

"If this had happened last year, we would probably have been hiding in a shelter," he added, reflecting how some Donetsk-region residents are adapting to the Kremlin's frontal assault.

President Volodymyr Zelensky congratulated Ukraine's Orthodox believers saying "we celebrate the Easter holiday with unshakable faith in our victory."

But for some Ukrainian soldiers in Sloviansk, the reality and brutality of war has shaken them spiritually.

"I tried to," Natalia Melnyk said, answering AFP journalists whether she believes in God.

"My service to God and the military are separate. I believe in people," added the 40-year-old, from the central Zhytomyr region who has served in the Ukrainian military for five years.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine has left tens of thousands dead, displaced millions and torn apart towns and cities across the country.

The Institute of Religious Freedom, an advocacy group, recently said nearly 500 religious buildings had been damaged during hostilities.

Authorities have meanwhile advised residents of the Donetsk region to avoid graveyards this year, giving demining teams time to sweep them all.

Several kilometres from Sloviansk, AFP journalists this weekend saw a hand-drawn sign warning of explosives at steps leading up to a sky blue convent in the village of Bogorodychne.

Presiding over the hamlet, on a hill, is what remains of an Orthodox church, one of its onion-domed towers toppled to the ground, a wall gouged by a missile and its pristine walls scabbed by shrapnel.

Yevgeny is one of the only residents to have returned to the idyllic village, where the only other sounds of life are chirping birds and stray dogs barking.

He recounted to AFP journalists how the church and its nearby buildings were destroyed last May.

He was sheltering in his basement when it was hit. Still, the blast knocked him back several metres across his room.

"We came out and there was smoke from bricks and concrete. The feeling -- you understand -- it was scary, of course. Early the next day we left the village. Through the forest to the next monastery," the 37-year-old said.

"Every year, when there was peace, we celebrated Easter there. Of course we can't go now," he added, nodding to the destroyed remains of the church behind his garden.

"We can't afford to go to Sloviansk. There's shelling there. It's better to stay at home."