Yesterday I spoke to Denis – living under siege in Bucha – in a shelter with his wife and three children. Denis agreed to speak to me on camera because he is angry, and he wants the world to know what Putin and Russian troops are doing to Ukraine and its people.

Here are some of his words:

I’m from Lugansk originally, and I was forced to move from there in 2014. I had to escape Lugansk through Russia. I’ve been seeing these bastards since 2014. Everything that I’m living through right now, I have actually experienced before. And I don’t want to experience it anymore.

Right now, I’m in Bucha. And right now all around us, there is fighting – Russian rockets, missiles, a lot of buildings bombed. People around me are scared and sitting in the basement. People who are not used to war are sitting in basements. They cannot go outside because they’re afraid to be shot by Russian insurgency groups.

There are still many women and children here. My wife has psychological issues right now, and I can’t leave her alone. We have three kids. I can’t go to war. I can’t take weapons [out in the street] because I have to be next to my wife.

The Russians are disinforming people about the “green corridor” saying that you can leave through the green corridor. But I know, if you pass through the green corridor, you will be killed. Or they are saying that you can leave through a railroad station, and then I’m listening to the radio, and I hear that the Russians actually just bombed that station with a missile. This happened like half an hour ago. 

What we want is that the sky gets closed. This is what we talk about all the time. We don’t want to see their planes. We don’t want to see their rockets anymore. We don’t want to see their troops. What I want to say to the Western world is just help us. We need weapons.

I’ve seen Russian insurgency groups right behind me, 16 meters away from me. We’ve been filming them; we have video cameras around our residential area and people have been filming them all over the place, blowing up cars, et cetera.

My friends who live in the suburbs of Kharkiv are seeing all of it too. They’ve seen [Russia’s] tanks, their vehicles, they’ve seen their troops and they’ve seen how the locals are throwing molotov cocktails, just to trying stop them. We’ve got the same situation. A lot of [Russian paramilitaries] all around here. They’re being killed. They’re killing people as well.

Trust me, there are a lot of them, and although we’re fighting them, we need your support. Please close the sky. We will have a chance in winning this war. We have to win.

Click here to see videos and photos Denis provided from the area of Bucha. To me, the most heartbreaking image is the US flag air freshener hanging from the rearview mirror, and the last image of Denis’ three sleeping children in the basement shelter.