Kat Lonsdorf

Cellist Yo-Yo Ma, left, with composer John Williams, right. The pair recently released a collaborative recording, <em>A Gathering of Friends</em>, with the New York Philharmonic.

Composer John Williams and cellist Yo-Yo Ma bring together 'A Gathering of Friends'

Mary Louise Kelly

On a new album, the classical stars revisit the concerto Williams composed specifically for Ma, as well as some of Williams' most affecting film scores.

A monument for Taras Shevchenko is symbolically protected by bandages in Borodyanka, northwest of Kyiv.

This is what one town in Ukraine looks like after Russian troops withdrew

Scott Detrow

The residents of Borodyanka are picking up the pieces after Russian forces withdrew and left behind a shattered town. Hundreds of people are still missing, presumed buried under rubble.

Vash Lavash in the western part of Ukraine reopened its doors and is employing people displaced by the war.

How a bakery in Ukraine is offering hope and employment in a time of crisis

Scott Detrow

In the western Ukraine city of Ivano-Frankivsk, a bakery that closed for two weeks during Russia's invasion has resumed business, feeding the masses and providing refuge in wartime.

Sunlight hits buildings the Tskhinvali Region, just across the boundary of South Ossetia, a Russian-occupied part of Georgia.

Russia's war in Ukraine reminds Georgians of what they survived in 2008

Mary Louise Kelly

In Georgia, people living on the frontlines of Russia's 2008 invasion say they worry about what Putin's war in Ukraine will mean for them.

Left to right: Alexey Voloshinov, 20, Nastasya Dubovitskaya, 23, Leonid Kabanov, 30, and Lev Kalashnikov, 35, are all Russians who are living in Tbilisi, Georgia, after leaving their country in recent weeks.

Meet the Russians who are fleeing — not the war, but their own government

Mary Louise Kelly

Thousands of Russians have left their country since their government began its invasion of Ukraine. Many have settled in Georgia, a country with a complicated history with its neighbor to the north.

Vitaliy Shutov says he is willing to fight for Ukraine if he needs to.

One witness describes the Russian invasion of Ukraine: 'I woke up and heard bombing'

Patrick Wood

When 22-year-old college student Vitaliy went to bed last night, he didn't think a Russian invasion of Ukraine would actually happen. Then he woke to the sounds of explosions.

Ukrainian Military Forces servicemen walk past a metal plate that reads "caution mines" on the front line with Russia-backed separatists.

Why Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons — and what that means in an invasion by Russia

Mary Louise Kelly

Three decades ago, the newly independent country of Ukraine was briefly the third-largest nuclear power in the world. A lot has changed since then.

The boundary between Ukraine and Russian-annexed Crimea.

On the Crimean borderland, Ukrainians define their identity

Kat Lonsdorf

In the borderlands near Crimea, there is a war for the hearts and minds of Ukrainian citizens.

People walk past an administrative building, in the Dniprovskyi residential district of Kyiv, underneath which is a bunker from the 1980s.

Bar, bookstore or bunker? Kyiv residents wonder where to shelter in case of war

Kat Lonsdorf

An underground world in the Ukraine capital is made up of Soviet-era bomb shelters, bunkers and basements. A potential Russian attack threatens to put the bygone shelter system to the test.

A woman walks towards the only crossing right now between the rest of Ukraine and the northernmost occupied territory, manned by guards on both sides who check documents in Stanytsia Luhanska.

The world worries of a Russian attack. But for these Ukrainians, war is already here

Kat Lonsdorf

NPR travelled towards the "temporarily occupied territories" on the Ukraine-Russia border, where the people who live there are in limbo – cut off from both Ukraine and Russia, cut off from the world.