Sacramento Woman From Ukraine Watches And Waits As Russia's Invasion Begins
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) — Ukrainian and Russian families are watching war unfold via social media and news feeds — their only means of communication. One Sacramento woman has been working around the clock to try to check in on her relatives.
Cell phone video captured air strikes outside Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine. These horrific images document Russia's invasion in the last 24 hours.
"What is going to happen is it's going to be a genocide," Tatyana Kaftan said. "I am going to have dead family."
Kaftan's family and friends have sent her these videos of the carnage.
"I have an uncle I have been trying to reach since yesterday in Kyiv," she said. "They were packing and leaving."
Tens of thousands were trying to get out harms way as the Russians dropped bombs and seized control of Chernobyl, the shuttered nuclear power plant.
"I think Russian people need to stand up. The Ukrainian president said you need to stand up and I think Russians need to stand up," Kaftan said.
Russian protests were being met with military-like force. It's a scene that's played out in the past, says Kaftan, who immigrated from the Ukraine as a teenager.
"You have a bully that comes in stomping his feet and this is what he wants," she said. "He did that to Georgia. He is going to do that again."
She worries about her cousin's children, who could be recruited to fight.
"I have family already fighting. I am getting pictures of women in uniform. It's devastating hat this man can do this," she said.
Kaftan says sanctions need to happen immediately, and the United States should take military action.
"Think how large [the] Soviet Union will become if Ukraine joins. They are going to become.. and then China. It's going to be huge," Kaftan said. "We need to look at it not just as [a] Ukrainian problem and Russia problem. This is a world problem. We are going to have a World War III on our hands."