Irish Examiner view: Entering Ukraine war’s darker moment

Members of the rescue service work to clean the debris and unstable structures on the roof of a residential building damaged after a Russian attack in Kharkiv, Ukraine, on Wednesday. Picture: AP Photo/Leo Correa

Many will know the poem ‘First They Came’ by the German Lutheran pastor Martin Niemöller. It is a warning of the perils of not speaking out when secret police bestride the land.

The final, haunting, stanza declares: “Then they came for me/and there was no one left/to speak out for me.”