Officially Over 300.000 People Were Internally Displace In Ukraine

In Nikolaevka the 'street of peace', as it's named, became a street of destruction in early July.

The region was transformed. Poor towns and villages became vicious battlegrounds. People fled. Officially over 300,000 have left their homes, often destroyed. The real number may be two or three times higher. They have become internally displaced in Ukraine

Around the corner from the street of peace, more devastation, an apartment block reduced to rubble.

Tamara and other former Nikolaevka residents went to see the ruin of their lives while others pick through the debris.

The 75-year-old former coal worker had bought a new TV and refrigerator for her apartment, but nothing is left.

She said she cried after seeing the devastation.

She said "I was standing and my tears were falling. I didn't mean to cry, but my tears were falling. And they have been falling for two months already and now the third. I can't do anything."

Since her apartment was bombed, Tamara has moved three times, becoming an internally displaced person (IDP) within her own town. All the town official could offer were rundown dormitory rooms.

She said "so I returned over and over and finally she stuck me in this place. Even this (pointing the damaged walls) I agreed to. I accepted everything already. We need to live somehow. I understand – it's a war."

When she moved in, the room had no windows. She paid from her pension to install glass but the walls still leak. She calls it a hovel.

From a target, Nikolaevka, a town of 16,000 people, has become a haven, housing more than 170 internally displaced from other ravaged towns.

Many of these IDPs moved in with relatives and friends and almost all depend on aid, including the weekly UNHCR packages handed out by local officials.

Tamara is one who comes to stock her almost empty refrigerator. Many IDPs have had to move several times as the fighting has exploded again and again.

Sveta, another IDP, has fled four times with her three children. She talks every day to her husband who returned to Debaltsevo to protect their home. She said she is uncertain about the future.

She said "at the moment I don't see any future. No one knows the truth. No one speaks the truth."

Anger but also shock. Like Sveta, many IDPs find it hard to understand how their life exploded. They want to go back but are still afraid.

For many it is lost belief. But for Tamara, it is a lost home, and something sadder. She has almost lost hope.

SHOTLIST
8 – 9 SEPTEMBER 2014, NIKOLAEVKA, UKRAINE

Various shots of destroyed buildings
Destroyed bridge
Nikolaevka, Ukraine
Bus on a road
Various shots, destroyed buildings
Tamara watching her destroyed house
Tamara at her house
Various shots, Tamara in the kitchen
Various shots, Tamara in her bedroom
Various shots, Nikolaevka,
Various shots, UNHCR distribution
Sveta walking with a UNHCR bag
Sveta walking out
Tamara and other women with UNHCR bags,
Tamara looking through the window in her apartment

SOUNDBITE (Russian) Tamara, displaced citizen within Ukraine:
"I was standing and my tears were falling. I didn't mean to cry, but my tears were falling. And they have been falling for two months already, and now the third. I can't do anything."

SOUNDBITE (Russian) Tamara, displaced citizen within Ukraine:
"So I returned over and over and finally she stuck me in this place. Even this (pointing the damaged walls) I agreed to. I accepted everything already. We need to live somehow. I understand – it's a war."

SOUNDBITE (Russian) Sveta, displaced citizen within Ukraine:
"At the moment I don't see any future. No one knows the truth. No one speaks the truth."

DURATION: 02:44