Bucharest, Feb 24 /Agerpres/ – An exhibition presenting photos from the war in Ukraine, captured by the special correspondent of the National News Agency AGERPRES Cristian Lupascu, during the three years of aggression by the Russian Federation on this country, was inaugurated on Monday in the foyer of the Senate.

The 33 photographs ‘of historical value’, selected from several thousand images, were taken in several Ukrainian cities, including Kyiv, between March 2022 and December 2024.

Present at the event, the interim president of the Senate, Mircea Abrudean, stated that the photographs should be seen by all those who may have doubts about Romania’s actions in support of Ukraine.

‘The photos have an extraordinary impact, with three years of war, with the misfortune that was and still is on Ukraine, caused by the Russian invasion, which some do not speak about correctly enough. I think that such images remind us once again how important our security is, how important it is that Romania is in NATO, that we have this security umbrella that our neighbors in Ukraine did not have and, at the same time, they remind us and confirm that the support that Romania gave to Ukraine from the first day of the conflict was justified and unconditional, without expecting anything in return. It would be good for many people to see these images – not only among decision-makers, but also ordinary people who may have doubts about Romania’s actions in support of Ukraine. I think this is the simplest message we can give and that emerges from these images’, stated Mircea Abrudean.

The chair of the Senate’s Culture Committee, Cristian Niculescu-Tagarlas, showed that the realities captured in the exhibited photographs are exactly the images that he himself saw, ‘as a simple man’.

‘I have been to Ukraine several times, but not as a press correspondent. I was as a simple man, although I was the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. I was there to see, with my own eyes, the atrocities that were being claimed. I even saw a children’s hospital in Kherson destroyed by the Russians with cluster bombs, I saw absolutely disturbing images. I saw houses from Nikolayev to Kherson crushed, piece by piece. The conclusions are very clear: the Russians were truly savages, not a single rule of war was maintained, but they simply wanted to send a message of terror, of mass destruction, of the destruction of all life in that area. Things are very complicated in that area and now. When I was there last year, there were prepared withdrawal zones, fortifications built behind the classic lines of ‘It is clear that the Russian pressure is very strong, but the Ukrainian people are defending themselves with stoicism and a lot of selflessness, and I don’t think they will give up this fight easily,’ said the liberal senator.

In his opinion, the exhibition should be seen by every Romanian so that they no longer let themselves be ‘influenced by fake news,’ according to which ‘the people there are not suffering.’

‘These are images that I have seen myself, exactly the crashed drones, exactly the war cartridges thrown everywhere, destroyed buildings, affected people, people who would swear at any time that they would not give up the fight against Putin, because the Russian troops and the way they fight there is an absolutely barbaric way. It is very important that every Romanian sees these images and no longer let themselves be influenced by fake news, that people are not actually suffering there. It is an extremely cruel war, and the Russians are showing their cruelty and savagery, and we must learn that the Ukrainian people, through the fight they are waging, are also defending Europe,’ stated Cristian Niculescu-Tagarlas.

AGERPRES correspondent Cristian Lupascu emphasized that the exhibited photographs have a ‘documentary character’.

‘I only did war correspondence. Nothing else. I did my job as a journalist and my texts were accompanied by photographs. These are documentary photographs, not artistic, they are photographs with a documentary, journalistic character. War journalism is mandatory. Information from the front is necessary to raise awareness of the devastating effects of these attacks, whether aerial or terrestrial. Unfortunately, behind these images, the drama of the Ukrainian people remains, with many deaths,’ declared Cristian Lupascu, who expressed his hope that the photographs, included in the AGERPRES archive, ‘will be valuable over time, because they transmit, until the end, information from the spot’.

The event was also attended by the general director of the AGERPRES National News Agency, Claudia Nicolae, as well as parliamentarians.