Ukrainian Teenage Hero Wins Medal at European Championship After Rescuing Russian Strike Victims
13-year-old Ukrainian Kyrylo Ilyashenko, who rescued people from a bus in Sumy during the Russian attack on 13 April, won silver at the European Beach Wrestling Championships for juniors.
The Gaze reports on this with reference to a post by Sumy mayor Artem Kobzar on social media.
The championship was held in the town of Poreč, Croatia.
The boy's mother said that her son returned to training a few weeks after undergoing surgery.
"His father and coach, Oleksiy Ilyashenko, developed a special training programme: taking into account his health condition, the physical load was gradually increased. In Croatia, Kyrylo stepped onto the sand not as a victim of war, but as a true fighter. And he won a silver medal at the European Championships," she said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy awarded Kyrylo Ilyashenko with a new honorary award, ‘The Future of Ukraine,’ according to the Sumy Regional Administration.
During the Russian strike on 13 April, Kyrylo was travelling on a bus with his mother. When the explosion occurred, the bus doors were blocked. The boy managed to get out of the burning bus and helped other survivors to escape, including relatives of his classmates.
He himself had three pieces of shrapnel in his head. Most of the bus passengers and the driver were killed, which is why it was nicknamed the ‘death bus.’
A total of 35 people were killed in the city at that time, two of whom were children. Another 120 were injured.