“According to the ombudsman, it probably happened on the night of December 21”, — write: www.radiosvoboda.org
“Cruelty knows no bounds: the Russians probably killed 7 civilians in Pokrovsk. I learned about this today from social networks. The Ukrainians were hiding in the basement of a residential building, where two soldiers of the Russian army broke into. Two civilians came out to the occupiers: a father and a son, from whom the Russians demanded alcohol. When they were told that there was no alcohol, the occupiers opened fire and killed the father and son,” he wrote in a telegram.
According to Lubinets, after that the Russian troops went down to the basement and shot other people there: among those killed was a whole family – a couple, their son, a woman’s mother, only one wounded man managed to survive, pretending to be dead.
“This case shocks with its brutality and cynicism. I have already sent official letters to the ICRC and the UN. The whole world should see the faces of Russian soldiers who came to kill civilians! I would like to emphasize that the events in Pokrovsk are not isolated. They fit into the systematic practice of violence, which Russian troops use against civilians in the TOT and the front-line territories of Ukraine,” Lubinets added.
On December 17, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Oleksandr Syrskyi, said that Russian troops have been trying to capture Pokrovsk for more than 17 months, but Ukrainian units are holding the defense and intercepting the initiative.
Pokrovsk – a city with a population of about 1,250 people (estimated by the local authorities at the end of October, before the start of the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation – more than 60,000) – is an important road and railway junction and was under threat of encirclement by Russian troops for most of the year.