Russian attack damages Sophia of Kyiv reserve and Security Service of Ukraine building protected by UNESCO – photos

A Russian attack on the main Security Service of Ukraine headquarters damaged the 18th-century Consistory Building on the grounds of the Sophia of Kyiv National Reserve on 4 September.

Source: Ukraine's Ministry of Culture

Details: According to the ministry, the building's windows and window frames were damaged. There were no people killed or injured on the reserve's grounds.

The Sophia of Kyiv National Reserve is included on the UNESCO World Heritage List and the List of World Heritage in Danger. It is also under enhanced protection under the Second Protocol to the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict.

The Ministry of Culture noted that the attack on the reserve constitutes a gross violation of international humanitarian law and threatens cultural heritage of global significance.

This is not the first time the reserve has been affected by Russian strikes. In June last year, a blast wave damaged part of the facade of the 11th-century architecture of St Sophia's Cathedral. As a result of the blast wave, the moulding of the central apse fell off.

The main Security Service of Ukraine headquarters building was also damaged. It is a listed architectural and historical monument and is located within the UNESCO-approved unified buffer zone of the sites "Kyiv: Saint-Sophia Cathedral and Related Monastic Buildings, Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra".

History of the building

At the beginning of the 20th century, the estate of Professor Georgy Rein stood at 33 Volodymyrska Street in Kyiv's Shevchenkivskyi District. In 1910, it was purchased by the Kyiv Society for Emergency Medical Aid using donations from philanthropists Oleksandr Tereshchenko and Lazar Brodsky. The site was intended to house an emergency medical station complex.

However, two years later, the Society exchanged the estate for another plot of land owned by the Kyiv Provincial Zemstvo. Eventually, the estate was demolished, and in 1913 construction began on a large building for the representative bodies of Kyiv Governorate, designed by architect Volodymyr Shchuko.

Construction was completed only in 1928, under Soviet rule, as the First World War had interrupted the project.

At various times, the building housed trade unions, the Central Committee of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Ukraine, and later state security agencies. It is now home to the Security Service of Ukraine headquarters.

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