Oleksandr Matsievskyi’s final moments went viral (Picture: Reuters; East2West News)
A soldier who defiantly declared ‘Glory to Ukraine’ while taking a last puff on his cigarette before being executed by Russian troops has been commemorated with a statue in his hometown.
Oleksandr Matsievskyi’s final moments went viral, with Volodymyr Zelensky later hailing him as a symbol of resistance for the Ukrainian people.
The president posthumously awarded him the ‘Hero of Ukraine’ medal.
In the video, shared in March, the sniper with a unit from Chernihiv can be heard saying ‘Slava Ukraini’ – a century-old phrase popular as an expression of resistance to Russia’s invasion.
Standing smoking a cigarette in a wooded area, apparently unarmed, Matsievskyi is then seen slumping to the ground in a hail of gunfire from unseen shooters.
Kyiv blamed ‘brutal and brazen’ Russians for his death, as did his mother Paraska Demchuk, 68.
To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web
browser that
supports HTML5
video
Oleksandr Matsievskyi was posthumously awarded the ‘Hero of Ukraine’ medal (Picture: social media/EAST2WEST NEWS)
Flowers lie next to the statue of Ukrainian serviceman Oleksandr Matsievskyi, who was executed by Russian troops in 2022 (Picture: Reuters)
‘He would have taken all of them with him if he had a grenade,’ she said, as she proudly showed the medal Zelensky bestowed on her son.
Holding back tears, she added: ‘He would say to me, “Mum, I will never let them capture me”. He wouldn’t just bandy words about.
‘It was on the inside, it was like a core inside him.’
Kyiv has opened a criminal investigation into Matsievskyi’s death.
He was quickly talked of as a hero on social media, where many supporters posted the words ‘Heroyam Slava’, or ‘Glory to the Heroes’, the traditional response to Slava Ukraini.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
For more stories like this, check our news page.