Thousands marched along Chicago Avenue in Chicago's Ukrainian Village Community on Sunday afternoon, one day ahead of Ukrainian Independence Day.
People waived flags, handed out flowers, and wore traditional costumes as Ukrainian music filled the air.
Bogdan Muzyka was watching the Ukraine Unity March and told WBBM it's important to show pride after years of war with Russia, "In America, it's a great country where we're allowed to express ourselves, whoever you are...the ability to be able to do stuff like this (hold a march) is such a great thing to have and it brings attention to us (the Ukrainian community) about what we're going through and expose other people to the struggles that we have as well."
Anna Soroka fled Ukraine because of the war and said, "My residential building in a city named Kharkiv was hit by a rocket one month ago, so it's (the war) happening for real, still, yes."
Marta Farion is Vice President of the Ukrainian Congress Committee in Chicago and one of the organizers of Sunday's march, and added, "we are here to support Ukraine on Independence Day, and especially at this time which is the fifth year of the war with Russia, we're here to support Ukraine...and we're here also to ask the United States Congress to support the sanctions bill against Russia."
Vera Eliashevsky is co-chair of the Chicago-Kiev sister cities program and told WBBM Ukraine is a huge part of Chicago, "...we have schools, cultural centers, dance groups, you name it...how many churches do we have? You can see here in the parade how many organizations that we have."
WBBM asked Eliashevsky if she knows people in Ukraine who have been killed in the war and, under a sunny Chicago sky, she paused for a moment and replied softly, "Yes...yes, unfortunately."
