The Russian Red Cross Society (RRC) has provided aid to more than one million refugees from Ukraine, RRC President Pavel Savchuk said on Monday.
"The RRC has been involved in the assistance efforts from the very beginning. Since February 22, 2022, more than one million refugees and migrants from Ukraine and Donbass have received assistance from the RRC. The overall number of those who received help in 2022 and in the five months of 2023 has reached two million, i.e. nearly half of them are migrants due to the Ukrainian crisis," he said.
The RRC, in his words, has been introducing new types of assistance, such as pharmacy and commodity vouchers. "We have introduced a system of vouchers to a certain sum, which can be used to pay for clothes, food, or medicine. Last year, more than 93,000 people received such vouchers, 620,000 people received humanitarian and hygienic kits," he said.
According to Savchuk, nearly 92,000 people have received direct payments totalling 300 million rubles ($3.75 mln). "These allowances help those in need to improve their lives," he said, adding that the allowances range from 5,000 (some 63 US dollars) to 15,000 rubles depending on the family. Allowances are paid to the elderly, families with many children, single-parent families, people with disabilities, and other categories.
Apart from that, in his words, the RRC helps those refugees who want to return to their homes. "For instance, a group of refugees from the Tambov Region want to return to Mariupol. A lot of infrastructure and housing has been built in the city. People are returning there and we want to support them, provide them with transportation, meals, and water," he added.
Acting LPR interior minister operated on after being wounded in blast in central Lugansk
Igor Kornet is now in stable condition.
Acting Interior Minister of the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR) Igor Kornet has been operated on after being wounded in a blast in central Lugansk and is in stable condition now, Kornet’s former adviser and military expert Vitaly Kiselev told TASS on Monday.
"Now, Igor [Kornet] is in stable condition. More time is needed to assess his condition. Doctors say he underwent a difficult surgery," he said.
An attempt on Kornet’s life was staged in central Donetsk on Monday. A grenade exploded inside a barber’s shop wounding seven people. Kornet was taken to a hospital with severe wounds. Later, a spokesman for local law enforcement told TASS that a passerby was killed in the blast. Russia’s Investigative Committee opened a criminal case. According to local emergency services, nine people were evacuated from apartment blocks near the blast site.
As Donetsk civilians live in constant fear of Ukrainian shelling, a reporter on the ground details the terror
Heavy Ukrainian shelling of central Donetsk on April 28 killed nine civilians – including an eight-year-old girl and her grandmother – and injured at least 16 more. The victims were burned alive when the minibus they were in was hit by a shell.
The attack also targeted a major hospital, apartment buildings, houses, parks, streets, and sidewalks. All civilian areas – not military targets.
According to the Donetsk People’s Republic's (DPR) Representative Office in the JCCC (Joint Monitoring and Co-ordination Center on Ukraine’s War Crimes), Kiev's forces fired high-explosive fragmentation missiles “produced in Slovakia and transferred to Ukraine by NATO countries.” Regarding an earlier shelling on the same day, the JCCC noted that US-made HIMARS systems were used, targeting “exclusively in the residential, central quarter of the city.”
Another tragic day for the people of the Donbass. More Ukrainian war crimes, slaughtering 9 civilians in Donetsk yesterday, including 1 child, and injuring at least 16 more when Ukraine rained munitions down on residential areas of the city, once again. pic.twitter.com/hQanExMWul
— Eva Karene Bartlett (@EvaKBartlett) April 29, 2023
I was outside of Donetsk interviewing refugees from Artyomovsk (also known as Bakhmut) when both rounds of intense shelling occurred, the first starting just after 11am. I returned to see a catastrophic scene, with a burnt-out bus – still smoking – and some of its passengers’ charred bodies melted onto the frame. This tragic picture was sadly not a one-off event.
Elsewhere, city workers were already removing debris and had begun repaving damaged sections of the roads. I’ve seen this following Ukrainian shelling many times, including on January 1 this year, when Ukraine fired 25 Grads into the city centre. Similarly, in July 2022, Ukrainian shelling downtown killed four civilians, including two in a vehicle likewise gutted by flames. When I arrived at the scene about an hour later, workers were repaving the affected section of the street.
The damage to the Republican Trauma Center hospital was quickly cleaned up, but videos shared on Telegram immediately after the shelling show a gaping hole in one of the walls. The room concerned contained what was, apparently, Donetsk’s sole MRI machine.
Along Artyoma street, the central Donetsk boulevard targeted countless times by Ukrainian attacks, the destruction was evident: Two cars caught up in the bombing, residents of an apartment building boarding up shattered windows and doors, the all-too-familiar sound of glass and debris being swept away. In the residential area, the first to be targeted that day, in a massive crater behind one house, the walls and roof of another home were intermixed with rocket fragments.
Another tragic day for the people of the Donbass. More Ukrainian war crimes, slaughtering 9 civilians in Donetsk yesterday, including 1 child, and injuring at least 16 more when Ukraine rained munitions down on residential areas of the city, once again. pic.twitter.com/hQanExMWul
— Eva Karene Bartlett (@EvaKBartlett) April 29, 2023
Another year of Ukrainian war crimes
In April 2022, following strikes on a large market area in Kirovsky district, in western Donetsk, which killed five civilians and injured 23, I went there to document the aftermath, not expecting to see two of the five dead still lying in nearby lanes. This shelling was just before noon, a busy time of day in the area. Bombing at such periods is an insidious tactic to ensure more civilians are maimed or killed.
Double and triple striking the same areas is another method used by Ukrainian forces. In an interview last year, the director of the Department of Fire and Rescue Forces of the DPR Ministry of Emergency Situations, Sergey Neka, told me, “Our units arrive at the scene and Ukraine begins to shell it. A lot of equipment has been damaged and destroyed.”
Andrey Levchenko, chief of the emergency department for the Kievsky district of Donetsk, also hit by Ukrainian attacks, said: “They wait for 30 minutes for us to arrive. We arrive there, start assisting people, and the shelling resumes. They wait again, our guys hide in the shelters, as soon as we go out, put out the fire, help people, then shelling resumes.”
Excerpts from my report on Ukraine's targeting of Donbass rescuers, war crimes.
— Eva Karene Bartlett (@EvaKBartlett) September 3, 2022
In August, the Donetsk Fire & Rescue Dpt Director told me 40 employees had been injured, 4 killed. In past few days, reports from the DPR note 14 more rescuers have been killed, 9 more injured. pic.twitter.com/fzhcRoOwLT
I was here in Donetsk in mid-June, during a day of particularly intense Ukrainian shelling of the very centre of the city, which killed at least five civilians. The DPR authorities reported that “within two hours, almost 300 MLRS rockets and artillery shells were fired.” One Grad rocket hit a maternity hospital, tearing through the roof.
The following month, Ukraine fired rockets containing internationally-banned ‘petal’ mines. The streets of central Donetsk, as well as the western and northern districts and other cities, were littered with the hard-to-spot mines designed to grotesquely maim, but not necessarily kill, anyone stepping on them. These mines keep claiming new victims to this day – when I last wrote about them here, 104 civilians had been maimed, including this 14-year-old boy. Three had died of their injuries. Since then, the number of victims has risen to 112.
I was here in Donetsk in mid-June, during a day of particularly intense Ukrainian shelling of the very centre of the city, which killed at least five civilians. The DPR authorities reported that “within two hours, almost 300 MLRS rockets and artillery shells were fired.” One Grad rocket hit a maternity hospital, tearing through the roof.
Even with warning, these nefarious "petal"/"butterfly" mines dropped by Ukraine on Donetsk are hard to see & easy to miss.
— Eva Karene Bartlett (@EvaKBartlett) August 1, 2022
Ukraine is committing war crimes against the civilians of the Donbass, and has been for 8+ years. pic.twitter.com/p5byG95GVG
The following month, Ukraine fired rockets containing internationally-banned ‘petal’ mines. The streets of central Donetsk, as well as the western and northern districts and other cities, were littered with the hard-to-spot mines designed to grotesquely maim, but not necessarily kill, anyone stepping on them. These mines keep claiming new victims to this day – when I last wrote about them here, 104 civilians had been maimed, including this 14-year-old boy. Three had died of their injuries. Since then, the number of victims has risen to 112.
The November 12 shelling of Gorlovka damaged a beautiful historic cultural building, destroying parts of the roof and the theatre hall within. According to the centre’s director, it was one of the best movie theatres in Donetsk Region, one of the oldest, most beautiful, and most beloved buildings in the city. He noted that the HIMARS system is a very precise weapon, so the attack was not accidental.
The shelling goes on
Early morning during Easter Mass on April 16, the Ukrainian army fired 20 rockets near the Cathedral of the Holy Transfiguration in the centre of Donetsk, French journalist Christelle Neant reported, noting that one civilian was killed and seven injured. The shelling extended to the central market just behind the cathedral. Just over a week prior, on April 7, another shelling of that market killed one civilian and injured 13, also considerably damaging the market itself.
Ukraine continues to shell the western and northern districts of Donetsk, also pounding Gorlovka, as well as Yasinovatya just north of Donetsk (killing two civilians some days ago).
On April 23, shelling in Petrovsky, a hard-hit western Donetsk district, killed one man and injured five more. The same day, in a village northeast of Donetsk, a rocket killed two women in their 30s. Security camera footage shows the moment when the women attempted to take cover. The munition that killed them hit directly next to where they huddled.
A few days later, on my way to interview refugees from Artyomovsk sheltering in another city, I passed along the tiny village where those women were killed. It’s a road I’ve driven a dozen times or more, a quiet, calm, scenic region of rolling hills, a lovely river, a beautiful church. It’s far from any front line. The murder of these two women was another Ukrainian war crime.
The people here are constantly terrorized by Ukrainian shelling or the threat of it, and have been since Kiev started its war on the Donbass in 2014.
