Ukrainian mom’s pain at watching daughter’s burial on phone

By EVGENIY MALOLETKA
Associated Press

LVIV, Ukraine (AP) — Viktoria Kovalenko bore witness to the death of her husband and elder daughter when their car was hit by a shell in northern Ukraine. By the time her loved ones got a proper funeral weeks later, she was 500 kilometers away, able to watch the burial only on a cellphone video sent to her by relatives.  Even in the relative peace of Lviv, a city little touched by violence in the war with Russia, it was an ordeal she couldn’t endure.  “Tears do not let me watch until the end,” she said as she played the video in a wooded area where she was pushing her one year-old daughter Varvara in a stroller.