Europe, flowers and flags. But "where are our heroes?"

Flowers and flags after three years are all that remains of hundreds of thousands of men. Tough faces or carefree smiles, martial poses and everyday gestures among a sea of ​​numbers. And a motto: "Glory to the heroes". Politicians repeat it because it is the blood that feeds national greatness, families and friends to give meaning to death. It is difficult to say who between the two needs it more.

The beautiful winter sun that shines in the sky of Kiev equally warms the foreign delegations that have come to show their support to Ukraine under the column of Maidan Square and the distant cemetery of Lisove. Along the avenue that leads to the military section there are thousands of flags: warriors, Spartan helmets, wolves, bears, Templars and everywhere yellow and blue. In the silence of the cemetery all these less sacred insignia have a grotesque, out of place appearance. An old woman has turned her hands purple from clearing snow without gloves from her son's grave, in a plastic cup she collects every foreign element, even the leaves. She remains bent over cleaning the small altar as if it were an island where only she lives.

A FEW ROWS AHEAD, another woman stares at an image carved in marble. It is her son, born on February 24 and died 100 days ago near Kupiansk, in the east. She can barely speak but tells us that the boy spent just two weeks at the front before dying, perhaps one of the many who had just finished training. "I've been coming here every day since they brought him," her voice breaks and her eyes are black slits, "and I've seen at least 15 new rows added."

Each row has 4 graves on the ground per side, they are rectangles with wooden edges and a platform covered with a kind of synthetic lawn where you can find everything, from a guitar to beer mugs, from model motorcycles to packs of cigarettes. Some burials are very recent and there is only the mound of earth. But the wreaths, ribbons and candles, as per Orthodox custom, are everywhere. It is a floral riot, among flags and snow. "Loving husband... brotherly friend... brother..." they all died in 2024. A boy with a titanium leg sticking out of his pants limps to a grave and unfurls a regimental flag with dozens of signatures. At the end of the avenue the burials stop abruptly but the road has been cleared for a long stretch.

In Maidan Square, Zelensky and the first lady hold the Ukrainian flag between two wings of authority.

THE HEAD OF STATE recalls that if Kiev falls, the Baltic and Nordic countries could be next. They seem to agree, judging by the fact that they are all here and by the economic and military support they continue to give to Ukraine. Von der Leyen repeats that "in this fight for survival, it is not just the fate of Ukraine that is at stake, but that of Europe", promises more weapons in the short term and a 3.5 billion euro loan by March. Of the large European countries, only the Spanish Sánchez is there, Meloni did not show up due to "institutional commitments", Macron and Starmer are in the US, the German prime minister in pectore from Berlin immediately urges to build a common defense and receives Zelensky's congratulations.

THE HOST calls on Russia to exchange all prisoners of war as a "sign of goodwill" to demonstrate that it truly wants to begin the ceasefire process. It is perhaps no coincidence that today the Ukrainian leader remembers his soldiers in Russian prisons. Now more than ever, the government needs to demonstrate that it is close to the people and obtaining the gratitude of hundreds of families who will be called to vote in the near future is essential.

In Podil, in the lower city, there is a demonstration of mothers and wives of missing soldiers or prisoners of war. There aren't many of them, they assure us that last year there were more, but they are not discouraged. They hold out personalised Ukrainian flags with the photo of the missing person and some data (the name, the brigade number, the last known place of sighting). Old Stefania has a sign with the years from 2022 to 2024 crossed out and a question mark over 2025. She says that her son, Andriy, was included in a list of soldiers to be exchanged for Russian prisoners of war last year, but that since then he has not heard anything about it. "I had a tumor, in the last two years I have almost never gone out, but today I wanted to be there..."

OLGA KNOWS NOTHING about her husband since the Ilyushin Il-76 plane coming from Belgorod with 65 Ukrainian prisoners on board was shot down by the Ukrainians themselves in 2024. The authorities in Kiev claim that the plane was carrying missiles, while Moscow replies that they had informed the other party of the exchange. The fact is that Olga's husband was probably on board and now the woman is waiting. What? "A confirmation, they have already done the DNA test, but I want to know what part of the body it was because it has already happened that they had given up a soldier for dead by the hand or the leg and then months later it was discovered that he was still alive but mutilated". "Let's hope", she concludes, and no one has the heart to reply. There are many women who have seen videos on Russian Telegram channels in which they recognized their loved ones, but even in those cases there is nothing to be done. "Where are our heroes?" reads a sign.

IN THE EVENING some people gather in Maidan Square, now reopened to traffic, with candles, flags and flowers. "Three times glory to the heroes" shouts a boy with an Azov flag, the square responds. Next to the crowd, on the flowerbed that in recent years has become a shrine, hundreds of photos among the snow and the flags. A child with a photo half the size of him is about to fall asleep, his mother accompanies him to arrange that kind of icon near the others, they light a candle together, then she disappears with the little one in her arms into one of the underpasses of Khreschatyk Avenue.