One year later: Olenivka prison massacre anniversary raises more questions for investigators
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Even after a year, the Ukrainian investigation cannot understand what motivated the terrorist attack at the colony in occupied Olenivka in July 2022, which led to the death of Ukrainian prisoners of war.
Taras Semkiv, the Deputy Head of the Department of Combating Crimes Committed in the Conditions of Armed Conflict of the Prosecutor General's Office, told Radio Svoboda that they still cannot understand the reasons.
"It is obvious that this is a war crime," Semkiv stressed. "The Russian Federation cynically violates the norms of international humanitarian law when it is obliged to provide appropriate protection to prisoners of war, such as the people who were in Olenivka, but it did not do it."
Semkiv added it was difficult to talk now about the motives for which they did it: whether it was hatred of Ukrainian servicemen for resisting armed aggression or some personal reasons.
"But it is obvious that a war crime was committed. No one has any doubts," he said.
Also, the Prosecutor General's Office still does not have data on the exact number of dead and wounded in Olenivka. After all, Ukraine does not yet have access to this territory for investigation.
What we know about the prison massacre in Olenivka, Donetsk region
On the morning of July 29 last year, the Russian media reported on the shelling of the colony in Olenivka, Donetsk region, where Ukrainian prisoners were kept. Propagandists claimed that there were at least 53 dead.
The General Staff of Ukraine refuted the accusations of the Russian Federation that the Armed Forces of Ukraine carried out the attack. According to the General Staff, the Russians tried to hide the evidence of the torture and murder of Ukrainian prisoners.
Intelligence agencies believe that the killing of Ukrainian prisoners in Olenivka, Donetsk region, was organized by the Wagner mercenaries on the personal instructions of Yevhen Prigozhin without coordinating with the leadership of the Russian Ministry of Defense.
The Security Service of Ukraine intercepted telephone conversations in which the Russians confirmed that Russian troops were responsible for the explosion in the occupied Olenivka colony, which killed at least 53 Ukrainian prisoners.
Azov units announced a hunt for all those involved in the mass murder of Ukrainian prisoners of war in Olenivka on July 29. In August, the United Nations created a commission to investigate the deaths of Ukrainian prisoners of war in the colony of occupied Olenivka. It included a retired Brazilian police lieutenant general, an Icelandic diplomat, and a Nigerien police officer.
On January 6, Lubinets said that the UN disbanded the mission to establish the facts of the killing of Ukrainian soldiers in Olenivka. The UN did not even condemn Russia, which did everything to prevent the mission from investigating the incident of July 29, when more than 50 defenders of Ukraine were killed.
Recently, the investigator, the journalist of the Media Initiative for Human Rights, Maria Klymyk, stated that after a terrorist attack in the colony in Olenivka, where Ukrainian soldiers were kept, the guards of the institution opened fire on those who escaped from the barracks.
