UKRAINE. Donetsk. Torez. 2006. Pensioner friends walk home after a birthday party in their neighborhood. Torez was once a flourishing coal mining town. Under communism, miners' salaries were among the highest in the Soviet Union and miners were seen as national heroes. But since Ukrainian independence the coal industry has attracted little government investment. The mines here are deep and extraction unprofitable. With many mines in disrepair, safety has become an issue. Scores of them have been closed, leaving many miners jobless.