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Yuriy Dolgorukiy, the prince who founded Moscow, lies buried in Kyiv — on the grounds of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra. Overnight on 15 June, a Russian missile and drone barrage set the monastery’s Dormition Cathedral on fire.
The Lavra is a UNESCO World Heritage site, and carries enhanced protection under the 1954 Hague Convention’s Second Protocol — a status meant to keep such places off any target list, Tetiana Berezhna noted. Striking it is “one of the gravest crimes against world cultural heritage,” said Berezhna, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister for humanitarian policy and culture minister.
The scramble to save the relics
The fire took hold on the roof of the Dormition Cathedral, the medieval principal church of the complex. Monks and rescuers carried out ancient icons, antimensia, and other items of “national and universal value,” the Lavra’s abbot, Bishop Avraamiy, said.
Emergency crews contained the blaze within safety protocols, Kyiv authorities reported. The full scale of the damage is still being assessed.
One of the largest attacks on Kyiv in months
The strike on the Lavra came during a massive overnight assault. Monitoring channels reported 27 missiles fired at the Kyiv region within an hour, and the barrage cut power to about 140,000 residents while damaging multiple residential blocks.
At least five people were injured and four hospitalized, Kyiv authorities said, with figures preliminary as the threat continued. Russia struck Kharkiv the same night, sparking fires across the city.
A monastery older than Moscow
The Lavra is older than the city whose founder it holds. Founded in 1051, it predates by nearly a century the first mention of Moscow in 1147, the year tied to Dolgorukiy. UNESCO inscribed the monastery as a World Heritage site in 1990 and added it to the List of World Heritage in Danger in 2023.
Dolgorukiy lies on the grounds at the Church of the Savior at Berestove. The Dormition Cathedral itself was destroyed in 1941 and rebuilt by independent Ukraine in 2000.
Not the first wartime strike
In January, a Russian drone damaged the entrance to the Far Caves and a nearby church — the first time since World War II that a structure of the monastery had been hit, the reserve’s director said.
Metropolitan Epiphanius, head of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, wrote on X:
“As a result of Russian shelling happening right now, on the night of 15 June, the roof of one of the holiest sites in the Christian world—the Dormition Cathedral of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra—is on fire.
We ask for your prayers for the salvation of this holy site from destruction.
Yet another Russian crime against humanity, against history, against Christianity.
What else must the Kremlin’s Antichrist do for the world to realize it must act decisively to end Russian terror against Ukraine and against the very principles of peace?
Most Holy Mother of God, stop Herod!”
Russian strike damages Kyiv’s ancient Pechersk Lavra for first time since World War II
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