Ukrainian Officials Are Appealing Directly to Russian Soldiers and Their Families as Casualties Mount

As representatives gathered for the United Nation’s first emergency session in decades on Monday, the most pointed moment came when Ukraine’s Ambassador highlighted not the plight of his countrymen, but of the young Russian soldiers invading his homeland.

“Mom, I’m in Ukraine,” Sergiy Kyslytsya read out in Russian, from printed text messages that he said were the last conversation between a Russian soldier and his mother before he was killed.