Yuri Kobzar14:15, 02/18/24

It is alleged that these are wounded soldiers who were unable to break through to the rear on their own during the retreat.

Russian occupiers shot six captured Ukrainian soldiers at the “Museum” position (on the “Zenith”) in Avdiivka . This was reported by the Ukrainian monitoring project DeepState .

“The brothers recognized the fighters from a video that was recently spread by Muscovites on the Internet. (…) Due to the fact that the positions were surrounded for several days, everyone who was walking had to fight their way to the main forces. Unfortunately, it was 4 non-walking guys (wounded) and 2 still walking guys who had no chance to get through without evacuation,” the message says.

DeepState claims that the decision to leave this position was not made for a long time – until on February 13, when ammunition and water supplies began to run out. According to the project, then there was an unsuccessful attempt to release the position, during which several soldiers were injured.

“Already understanding the tragedy and futility of defense, the command was given to break through the battle in small groups. Then an unpleasant incident occurred, which was already described by another soldier on Instagram, when the commander said about the wounded, “Abandon them to hell and burn everything.” The trouble is that it was the wounded soldier who heard it,” writes DeepState. 

According to the project, on February 14, exit in small groups began, and the wounded were promised evacuation the next day. According to DeepState, one of the surviving fighters was left with 5 wounded, and the very next day around noon the occupiers entered the position and a day later Russian publics distributed footage of the executed fighters.

“A series of mistakes and delays in decisive action led to such a tragedy. And the enemy once again proved that he is indifferent to all the rules of war,” writes DeepState.

Exit of the Defense Forces from Avdiivka

As UNIAN wrote, late at night on February 17, the commander of the Tavria operational group of troops, Alexander Tarnavsky, reported that Ukrainian forces, in accordance with the received order, left Avdiivka to previously prepared positions. He argued that the encirclement of Ukrainian forces was not allowed.

Commenting on the process of entry from Avdievka, a few hours earlier, Tarnavsky reported that “several of our fighters” were captured while trying to break through to safer positions.

The 3rd Assault Brigade also admitted isolated cases of being captured, but assured that there were no such cases at the level of squads, platoons and subunits.

(C)UNIAN 2024