'Still processing': Montreal doctor evacuated Ukrainian patients at train station just days before attack
Just days before a missile struck a Ukrainian railroad station, claiming dozens of lives, one Quebec doctor was helping hospital patients onto trains at that very spot.
Now, Dr. Joanne Liu is back home — and she says watching the destruction from afar has been devastating and "difficult to process."
"When you're in those kind of moments where people are fleeing, fleeing for their life, you think that somehow it will be respected," Liu told CTV News.
About 4,000 civilians had been near the station in Kramatorsk the day the missile hit, most of them women and children attempting to flee the Donbas region, where fighting is expected to intensify.
"It was an evacuation spot," said Liu, who is a Montreal emergency physician and the former international president of Doctors Without Borders. "So the fact that there was this attack on this train station is really outraging, to say the least, because it was done during the daytime when it was at the busiest of the activities."
Photos from the scene show bodies covered in tarps, with abandoned suitcases and children's toys scattered outside the station.
At least 52 died in the attack and over 100 people were injured.
Liu said that despite heightened risks, doctors remain committed to continue their work on the front lines.
"We're still processing what happened," she said. "It brings a new load of challenges to a certain extent. But we are going to continue to do that for the time being."
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
B.C. port employers to launch lockout as labour disruption begins
Employers at British Columbia ports say they are going ahead with locking out more than 700 foremen across the province after strike activities from union members began.
'The best that we can be': Indigenous judge and TRC chair Murray Sinclair dies at 73
Murray Sinclair, who was born when Indigenous people did not yet have the right to vote, grew up to become one of the most decorated and influential people to work in Indigenous justice and advocacy.
She was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes about a year ago. Here's how her condition was reversed
A year ago, Lorraine O'Quinn was coping with stress, chronic illness and Type 2 diabetes. Then she discovered a health program that she says changed her life.
India's Modi, Canada's Trudeau condemn violence at Hindu temple near Toronto
The prime ministers of India and Canada condemned violence that broke out on Sunday at a Hindu temple near Toronto at a time of escalating diplomatic tensions between the two countries.
3 people arrested after incident during protest at Hindu temple in Brampton, Ont.: Peel police
Peel Regional Police say three people are in custody as they continue to investigate an incident during a demonstration at a Hindu temple in Brampton on Sunday.
Judge rules against Alberta casino, dinner theatre operator
An application to stay a receivership order of Mayfield Investments Ltd., a company that owns multiple businesses in Alberta including the Camrose Resort and Casino, Medicine Hat Lodge and Calgary's Stage West Dinner Theatre, has been denied by the court.
'Giving women agency over their health': How innovative solutions are filling the gaps in Canadian menopause care
In a 2022 survey conducted by Leger Canada for the Menopause Foundation of Canada, about 46 per cent of women said they don't feel prepared for menopause, even though they know it's coming. At a time when tech-savvy millennials are starting their menopausal journeys, some tech entrepreneurs are stepping up with potential solutions to long-standing health-care deficiencies.
Frustration over Mideast war in America's largest Arab-majority city may push some away from Democrats
As an ongoing part of Omar on the Road: America Decides 2024, CTV National News visited the University of Michigan-Dearborn campus to talk to Arab-American students about why they’re feeling left out of the Democrats’ tent.
Ikea will pay 6 million euros to East German prisoners forced to build their furniture in landmark move
Furniture giant Ikea has agreed to pay 6 million euros (US$6.5 million) towards a government fund compensating victims of forced labour under Germany's communist dictatorship, in a move campaigners hope will pressure other companies to follow.