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‘Horror’ is the one-word reaction of North Texans with Russian and Ukrainian ties

“We don’t want Putin’s army to go and destroy Ukraine,” says Russian immigrant.

Dallas Telegraph publisher Serge Taran faced an unexpected challenge Thursday with the outbreak of war in Ukraine: Subscribers threatened to quit his publication serving Russians and Ukranians in their native languages.

“Russians don’t want to listen to Ukrainians. Ukrainians don’t want to listen to Russians,” Taran said.

Taran, who was born in Ukraine and went to college in Moscow, pivoted to an important task: An editorial begging for peace and a halt to bloodshed.

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Taran is one of thousands of North Texans trying to understand why Russian President Vladimir Putin would unleash such destruction on a nation of 43 million. For many, Wednesday was a night of tension, Thursday a morning of horror.

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Cell phones pinged with photos of fleeing Ukrainians. Encrypted messaging channels carried videos of anti-war protests in Russia. A Russian mother of three sons cried on the phone with a Dallas-area friend; she didn’t want her sons fighting Ukrainians.

“We want people to pray for peace and for people not to be killed,” Taran said, as he sketched out his editorial’s message for his trilingual publication, which also publishes in English.

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War “will affect every single American family,” said the Kyiv-born Taran. Disruptions of oil and food supplies are coming, he predicted.

President and Publisher of The Dallas Telegraph, Serge Taran, holds the paper in his hands...
President and Publisher of The Dallas Telegraph, Serge Taran, holds the paper in his hands while posing for a portrait at his home in Dallas. Taran has family in Kyiv, Ukraine.(Rebecca Slezak / Staff Photographer)

Many Russians and Ukrainians shared real-time videos through private messaging apps — a fierce global force uniting them with the Russian, Ukrainian and Armenian diaspora in the U.S.

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Irina Hightower, a Russian-born real estate advisor, received scenes from Kazan and Moscow of men being beaten. Another image from the streets showed young men and women with face masks due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I am not a politician, but what we see now leaves everyone shocked,” said Hightower, who moved to Dallas from Russia seven years ago.

“The majority of Russians and I support Ukraine and its people. We don’t want Putin’s army to go and destroy Ukraine. We want peace for innocent people.”

In Plano, Oganes Petrosian said he has a deep fondness for the Russian people. He was born in Armenia, when it was still part of the Soviet Union, and his family moved to Moscow, where he lived for more than two decades. Now, Petrosian co-owns Craft Food and another specialized market serving foods familiar to those from Russia, Ukraine, Armenia and other nearby countries.

“People are scared. They are buying more food. All the roads are now closed,” Petrosian said in a stream of emotion about the messages he was receiving about Ukrainians.

“I could never imagine there would be wars between Ukrainians and Russians. No way. It is very strange.”

Leonid Regheta, a pastor at the Russian River of Life Church in Plano, said he hardly slept the night of the invasion. Regheta toggles between two immigrant communities of Ukrainians and Russians at his church — and at home. He was born in central Ukraine. His wife was born in Russia.

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“There is absolutely no justification to what Putin is doing,” said Regheta. “This is just horror.”

Regheta didn’t believe the invasion would be of this scale. At first, Regheta thought Putin’s goal was to carve out sections of Ukraine, the second largest European country by land mass. But now, rumors are flying that Putin’s goal is to capture the capital of Kyiv by March 2, Regheta said.

Sunday at 2 p.m., the pastor of the Russian River of Life Church plans an international service with invitations to various ethnicities. Regheta hopes for “an outpouring of love and caring.”

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The Russian and Ukrainian populations are estimated to be only about 6,500 in North Texas as of 2019, according to the Census Bureau. But Ukrainian immigrants here estimate that those that speak Ukrainian and Russian number in the tens of thousands — and that would include the immigrants’ U.S.-born children.

Like Regheta, Stephen K. Wegren, a Russian expert at Southern Methodist University, said he didn’t anticipate the scale of Putin’s actions.

“I was surprised and depressed,” Stephen K. Wegren said. “I really believed deep in my heart Putin was bluffing, that this was a strong-man tactic to try to extract concessions.”

“This is their 9/11. Our 9/11 was an unprovoked attack, and now they are facing the same thing,” he said. “This is an absolute tragedy for humanity.”

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