GRIEVING families prayed for peace yesterday as a vast military cemetery laid bare Ukraine’s war losses.
Approximately 100,000 troops, which is more than the capacity of Wembley Stadium, have been lost by the embattled nation in the 35 months following Vladimir Putin’s invasion.
Russia has lost up to double that number as its ruthless president pours more men into assaults along Eastern Ukraine’s blood-soaked front line.
But the tyrant has calculated he will eventually win the war as he has more men to toss into the meat grinder than his enemy.
And Ukraine’s toll has now become impossible to hide at military cemeteries across the war-weary nation.
At Kharkiv Cemetery Number 18 yesterday, grieving loved ones braved bone-chilling cold to silently pay their respects.
Flags marked out a yellow and blue sea of sacrifice alongside endless rows of grey stone tombstones etched with the smiling faces of the fallen.
Previously, a few dozen soldiers who died in Russia’s first Donbas incursion in 2014 made up a corner of the graveyard.
But after the February 2022 invasion, their ranks expanded as far as the eye can see to 6,000 in just one cemetery.
Dmytro Neznamov and his elderly mother lit a candle at the war grave of his cousin Andrey Levtesov yesterday.
He told The Sun: “He was an artillery gunner killed by a Russian drone when he tried to save the crew of a tank.
“He was a builder before the war but joined up to defend his country when the Russians invaded and was 46 when he died in June last year.
“His family remember him as a man with a warm heart. But now he’s here with all the others, thanks to Putin.”
While the Russian tyrant expressed readiness to negotiate, hopes were shattered recently as Russia announced the deployment of its superfast Oreshnik missiles to Belarus, near Ukraine’s northern border.
Dmytro said: “We want this war to end. You can see we have lost too many good men.
“I’m proud of Andrey and men like him, but it’s time for the killing to stop.”
About 51,000 Ukrainians are missing, with more than 40,000 civilians dead and wounded.
Defence analyst Paul Beaver told The Sun: “Russia has the huge manpower advantage and a leader with no regard for the human cost to his own people.
“It’s a proper meat grinder.”
