Themes by tag: occupation

On May 13, a new modular town will be opened in Irpin, Kyiv region. It was put up on the territory of Lastivka health resort. 36 houses will accommodate people whose homes were destroyed as a result of the war, as well as displaced persons. Each house is designed for one family. Temporary housing was put up due to the efforts of the Finnish government.

• occupation
• reconstruction
• Kyiv

In the de-occupied village of Hrakove, Oleksandr, a farmer, kitted out his ordinary tractor to clear his fields of mines. The vehicle travels through the dangerous ground without a driver, as it operates by remote control.  Among other things, the sides of the tractor were reinforced with panels stripped from abandoned russian infantry fighting vehicles and wooden bars to protect it from shrapnel.

Important notice: photo and video recording can be dangerous. The tractor has already hit explosive devices twice.

For reference: Due to russia’s full-scale invasion, a third of Ukraine’s territory is heavily mine-contaminated. The explosive devices still remain in agricultural lands. Therefore, there are often reports of people being injured or killed while working in the fields.

• casualties
• occupation
• Kharkiv

Oleksii Surovtsev is a Ukrainian actor. At the beginning of the all-out russia invasion, he responded to a request to save a cat in Irpin. Since then, people have been asking him to take to safety their pets (cats and dogs) now and again.  Despite all the risks, he took the animals out of Irpin daily. And after the Ukrainian Armed Forces liberated the Kyiv region from the invaders, he set up a cat shelter and is now building a veterinary clinic.

• animals
• occupation
• volunteers
• Kyiv

In the occupied territories of Ukraine, russians most often resort to electric shock torture and beatings while tormenting civilians. The russian army mostly detains and abuses former military personnel and Joint Forces Operation participants, volunteers, civil and political activists, as well as government officials and entrepreneurs. These are the results of the ZMINA Center for Human Rights researchers study conducted from February 2022 to March 2023. 345 cases of torture of Ukrainian civilians were recorded. Media covering this topic will have the opportunity to talk to victims of russian crimes.

• casualties
• occupation
• russian crimes

On May 4, 2023, Dmytro Lubinets, the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights, will hold a large press conference in Kyiv.

The Commissioner is ready to speak about the atrocities he saw with his own eyes: torture chambers in the liberated regions of Ukraine, mass burials in Izyum, testimonies of people who were in occupation and who know from their own experience what the conditions in the torture chambers were like, the return of Ukrainian children kidnapped by the russian federation, communication with the russian Commissioner for Human Rights regarding humanitarian issues, the results of this communication, the return of Ukrainian soldiers who were in russian captivity, problems with the return of civilian hostages currently held by the russian federation.

Accreditation is required.

• children
• military
• occupation
• prisoners
• russian crimes
• Kyiv

On April 27, in Lviv, experts of the Heritage Emergency Response Initiative will present the results of their work. Experts spent over six months going on dozens of expeditions in Chernihiv, Sumy, Kyiv, and Kharkiv regions to record the damage caused to Ukrainian cultural heritage as a result of the russian invasion. The collected information includes: photographs of damage, documentation carried out in accordance with the methodology of the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property, eyewitness accounts, aerial photography, 3D models, etc.

Detailed program of the conference is available at:  https://bit.ly/3N2HLZX 

Awareness raising events will be held in Kyiv —  with a focus on looted museums, and in Kharkiv —  with a focus on war crimes against cultural heritage.

For reference: in February, Oleksandr Tkachenko, Minister of Culture and Information Policy, said that about 1,500 objects of cultural heritage and cultural infrastructure had been damaged or destroyed as a result of russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

• culture
• occupation
• russian crimes
• Lviv

At the beginning of the full-scale invasion the occupiers heavily shelled Yasnohorodka village near Kyiv. Houses and infrastructure were destroyed. People in the village were left without a medical facility. However, a modular urgent care center was recently put up there. The building was installed by Reinvent Ukraine Charity Organization, which specializes in the restoration of housing and social infrastructure. (The funds for the project were donated by a benefactor from the Czech Republic). The area of the modular urgent care center is 48 m². It is made of metal structures. The center has two doctor’s offices, a waiting area and a technical room.

• doctors
• occupation
• Kyiv

37-year-old Iryna Horobtsova worked in one of the Ukrainian IT companies and became famous with her posts on social networks about life under occupation. Iryna published photos with Ukrainian symbols, and called her apartment “the home headquarters of the resistance.” On May 13, 2022, the russians abducted her from her home and put her in a pre-trial detention center in Simferopol. No one is allowed near Irina, and she is kept in complete isolation from the outside world. The activist’s parents are ready to talk to the media representatives to share her story and get their daughter released as soon as possible.

• occupation
• prisoners
• russian crimes

Dobrobat volunteer movement members are rebuilding houses damaged by the Russian occupiers in the Demydiv in Kyiv Oblast. Currently, group volunteer recruitment is still ongoing to join the work.

For reference: “Dobrobat is a volunteer building division helping those affected to restore housing and social infrastructure in the de-occupied territories.

• occupation
• reconstruction
• russian crimes
• volunteers
• Kyiv

Tetiana is a resident of Hostomel and the head of two apartment buildings co-owners association. At the outbreak of the full-scale invasion, she opened all the basements for people to hide and placed pallets to have a stay.  Later, more than a hundred people were hiding there. There was even a 2-month-old baby among them. The woman did the cooking with her neighbors in her own apartment. When all communications were cut off, they prepared food on the street. A blast wave injured Tetiana’s husband.

On March 5, the occupants entered the houses and settled there. People stayed in the basements. Later, some of them decided to evacuate and go to another neighborhood, but they did not manage to leave. The occupiers told people to return, or they would be taken to Belarus. No one has been willing to. Instead, most went to the local prison bomb shelter. 

• occupation
• russian crimes
• Kyiv