Daytonians with family in Ukraine, Russia call for stop to invasion

Nagle was born in the small Ukraine town of Kryzhopil and has family and friends throughout the country. She says they have told her they are hearing gunfire and explosions and many are scared. But, she also said Ukrainians are resilient.

“We are going to fight to protect every inch of our land and do anything in our power to fight,” she said. “Our nation has had to fight a lot for our freedom and it’s cost us many, many lives and we are not going to give it up.”

Dayton-area residents who have family in Ukraine and Russia told the Dayton Daily News Friday the Russian invasion of Ukraine is wrong and should stop immediately.

Nagle said that watching the news and seeing the updates has been heartbreaking. Her parents were supposed to visit here this week, she said, but now that isn’t possible.

“I ask for support, and I am very thankful for all the prayers and all the love that I’ve been feeling the last several days,” she said. “There’s a lot of people supporting us. I would ask for the world to continue to support us because I don’t know if we can crush this monster alone.”

There is a large community of Ahiska Turks in Dayton and lot of them have a family member living in Ukraine, Eldar Muradov said, and all are feeling the impact of the invasion.

“The message to Russia is to stop the war,” he said. “War doesn’t benefit anybody. It only hurts the civilians and kills the future of little children. We don’t want war.”

Mirza Mirza said that war isn’t good for anybody and it needs to stop.

“As Ahiska Turks, we have family in both countries, in Russia and Ukraine, and it’s pretty hard for us to hear that one country is suffering as another country is attacking,” he said. “At this point, all we can do is move forward and try to see what we can do in order to help our family members out there.”

He said he has been in contact with family in both countries and they are all suffering because of the attack.

“When you have a war in one country and one of your family members is suffering, the other family members are pretty much not feeling good about it,” he said. “It’s pretty devastating what’s going on in the world.”

Muradov also called for the International Organization of Migration to help refugees displaced by the invasion into America. He said many Dayton-area families were brought into the country by the program and many are now businesses owners who pay taxes and contribute to the community.

“We came here 15 years ago and now the community has grown so much, we have contributed so much to the economy,” he said.

Reports said Friday that Russian forces were closing in on Ukraine’s capital. Watching the news and seeing Kyiv empty as Russia invades it is surreal for Lenora Shcherbyna, a Dayton woman married to a Ukrainian man.

“We’re looking at downtown Kyiv and it was a ghost town, and my husband says, ‘Do you remember that road when we were there?’ It was so crowded and now it’s empty,” she said. “It’s just kind of weird because Kyiv is a busy, bustling city, and to see it empty is strange.”

Lenora Shcherbyna, an intervention specialist at Trotwood Prep and Fitness Academy, met Yurii Shcherbyna a few years ago online and married him in Ukraine in 2019. Yurii Shcherbyna moved to America over the summer, and the couple lives in Dayton. Lenora Shcherbyna said her husband wasn’t comfortable speaking with media, but she agreed to talk about her experiences.

“It’s very hurtful and shocking. As my husband has said, there’s been problems growing over there for eight years,” Lenora Shcherbyna said. “So even in the years I’ve known him, tensions would rise and they would do military exercises and people would get nervous, and so they always felt like something was going to happen, but they didn’t know when.”

Yurii Shcherbyna is from Mykolaiv, a city in southern Ukraine near the Black Sea, and has family still in Ukraine. Lenora Shcherbyna said she has been in contact with his family there.

The relatives said they “woke up to explosions this morning, it was very shocking, everyone is sitting at home, we’re scared but we’re OK,” Lenora Shcherbyna said.

Lenora Shcherbyna has traveled to Ukraine four times since meeting Yurii Shcherbyna and was there most recently over the summer to help him pack for his trip to Dayton. She said people there were kind and the invasion is difficult to watch.

“It’s shocking and very disheartening. You’re so worried about the family that’s over there, but I do know that Ukrainians are very strong people,” she said.