Lyubov, a resident of the village of Darino in the Sudzha area, says she has had no contact with her mother since the Ukrainian forces entered Kursk more than two years ago. The local governor reports that over 300 Russians are still missing, but the true number is unclear.
After the incursion, Ukrainian troops stormed two border checkpoints in August 2024, taking around 40 prisoners and bombing a convoy carrying Russian soldiers. Within six days, they had overrun more than 777 square kilometres of Russian territory, diverting Russian forces from the front line.
Mobile and internet links were cut for eight months, leaving families unable to reach relatives. Nearly 200 Russians wrote to President Volodymyr Zelensky, President Vladimir Putin and the United Nations requesting a humanitarian corridor, but no evacuation occurred.
Lyubov and others formed groups to track missing persons, compiling lists from videos released by Ukrainian military and journalists. In early 2025, Russia’s human rights commissioner published a list of 517 Kursk residents reported missing, which mixed names of missing people with those searching for them, sparking anger among families.
Heavy fighting in late 2024 destroyed 90% of Darino. The Russian military reclaimed the village and began evacuating survivors and collecting bodies. Lyubov’s mother, who died of a head injury, remained missing until Lyubov located her body in a mortuary in Kursk in October 2025. The body was identified after a DNA sample, previously lost, was matched.
Lyubov’s mother was cremated, and her ashes now sit in Lyubov’s apartment in Belgorod, about 100 miles away. She remains bitter that the government failed to prevent the incursion, evacuate residents, or provide accurate information.
No response has come from the Kursk governor, Russia’s human rights commissioner or the Russian Red Cross to inquiries from the BBC.
