Ukraine unveils monument to soldier shot dead in widely shared video

Workers prepare to lift the statue of Ukrainian serviceman Oleksandr Matsievskyi, who was executed by Russian troops in 2022, at his memorial site, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Nizhyn, Ukraine, November 24, 2023. REUTERS/Thomas Peter

NIZHYN, Ukraine (Reuters) - A Ukrainian soldier who was posthumously awarded a medal after a widely shared video showed him declaring "Glory to Ukraine" before apparently being shot dead, was commemorated with a statue in his northern hometown on Saturday.

The video shared in March showed a man the military later named as Oleksandr Matsievskiy, a sniper with a unit from the region of Chernihiv, saying "Slava Ukraini," a phrase more than a century old that has become a popular expression of resistance to Russia's February 2022 invasion.