Soldier killed in battle few days before his father’s return from three years in Russian captivity. PHOTO
The sad news came from the Zaporizhzhia sector: a soldier, Yaroslav Boichuk, son of the famous Mariupol defender Oleksandr Boichuk, was killed while performing a combat mission.
The Boichuk family had been waiting for more than three years for Oleksandr to return from Russian captivity, where he was taken in March 2022 during the heroic defence of Mariupol.
Only on 14 August 2025, the defender was returned to Ukraine as part of a prisoner exchange. However, the meeting with his son never happened - Yaroslav had died earlier, Censor.NET reports.
As a reminder, Oleksandr Boichuk had been serving in Crimea as the commander of the "Henichesk" minesweeper and in the spring of 2014, during the annexation of the peninsula, he refused to break his oath and go over to Russia. After the outbreak of full-scale war, he took part in the defence of Mariupol, where he was taken prisoner.
His son Yaroslav followed in his father's footsteps and became a soldier. He performed combat missions at the front line.
