Since the beginning of the war, the Russians have kidnapped 30 mayors in Ukraine, some are still not found – Klitschko

Evgenia Sokolenko04:30, 12/31/22

According to him, the government did not give a clear answer to local officials whether they can leave their city in the event of a potential occupation.

Klitschko spoke about the kidnapping of mayors / photo kyiv.klichko.org

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said that since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, Russian occupation forces have kidnapped 30 mayors of Ukrainian cities.

Seven city leaders are still missing, he told The Spiegel .

“The mayors were targets everywhere. The Russians tried to arrest the mayors and use various methods to force them to cooperate,” the head of the Ukrainian capital explained.

According to Klitschko, the government did not give a clear answer to local officials whether they should leave their city in the event of a potential occupation or not. He added that the Ukrainians themselves had to make such a decision.

“The situation was difficult: if you stay with your community, you are a traitor … We have several times asked the government to give instructions: to stay or evacuate? But we did not receive a clear answer,” Klitschko summed up.

Kidnapping mayors

As UNIAN reported at the beginning of the war, there are numerous cases of the abduction of the heads of Ukrainian cities and villages by the occupiers.

In March, the chairman of the Zaporozhye regional military administration, Alexander Starukh, announced the kidnapping of the mayor of Dniprorudny, Yevgeny Matveyev .

In June , Russian invaders kidnapped the mayor of Kherson, Igor Kolykhayev. His adviser explained that Kolykhaev’s arrest was related to his refusal to cooperate with the occupying authorities .

In addition, they detained Alexander Babich , the mayor of Hola Pristan, Alexander Yakovlev , the mayor of Skadovsk, and Yury Paliukh, secretary of the City Council.

On March 11, in Melitopol, a group of invaders of 10 people kidnapped the mayor of the city Ivan Fedorov . On March 16, it became known that Fedorov was fired from the captivity of the invaders as a result of a special operation. He noted that the invaders accused him of financing the Right Sector .

(C)UNIAN 2022