In November last year, a Ukrainian evangelical church leader, Anatoliy Prokopchuk, and his 19-year-old son Oleksandr were abducted by Russian soldiers. Four days later, their bodies were discovered in a forest, with evidence the pair had been tortured and executed. Russian occupying forces closed down the three largest evangelical Protestant churches in Melitopol and shut down churches in Mariupol. In August, Ukrainian Baptist Theological Seminary President Yaroslav Pyzh estimated that about 400 Ukrainian Baptist congregations had been lost in the war in Ukraine, in part from evacuations and displaced communities, and in part from casualties and destroyed churches.