Nineteen years have passed since April 26, 1986, when the nuclear power plant at Chernobyl, about 90km north of Kiev, exploded and spewed a cloud of radioactive material over Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.
Chernobyl, says Mykhailo Skuratovskyi, Ukrainian Ambassador to South Africa, remains deeply embedded in the Ukrainian national psyche.
"Chernobyl will never be completely erased from memory... even the sparrows, of which there were many, are all gone," he says.
Built in the 70s, Chernobyl's destruction catapulted more than three million people into a human tragedy. Estimates vary, but as many as one million people are believed to have died in the aftermath.
"It will take many generations before the wounds are transferred from the present into the past," says Skuratovskyi who, along with his family, was in Kiev on the day of the catastrophe.
"Children were evacuated first and sent away over vast distances to escape the radiation."
His son, then five years old, was among the first to go.
"How do you explain to people that they must leave their homes and families, because of an invisible threat they do not understand," says Skuratovskyi.
Today, Chernobyl and all around it for a radius of 30km is a silent wasteland that bears bleak testimony to the world's worst nuclear accident.
The nuclear reactor has since been sealed and is constantly monitored to prevent any future escape of radioactive material.
The ambassador says the Ukraine spends about seven percent of its national budget, or about $6,5-billion, on rehabilitation programmes.
"We have witnessed increases in heart disease and cancer, especially among children.
"The social impact is almost impossible to calculate," he says.
The importance of overcoming the aftermath of the disaster is defined in the Ukraine's Constitution as a national priority.