8 April 2022 19:00

Politics

Filtration camps with interrogations, horror in Kramatorsk: Digest of foreign media as of April 8

Author

Olexandr Zakharov

Western media continue to write about the war in Ukraine: on April 8, the media covered a cynical attack by the Russian military on a train station in Kramatorsk crowded with women and children, and published an investigation about Ukrainians witnessing filtration camps built by occupiers who interrogate forcibly deported people.

Meanwhile, the European Union has approved a new package of sanctions for Russia, which should further suppress its economy, including an embargo on imports of coal and other goods.

offers an up-to-date review of what the European and American media write about, covering the 44th day of the active Russian invasion.

Kramatorsk: cynical murder of women, children

Фото: t.me/pgo_gov_ua

The Times writes about the tragedy on the Kramatorsk train station after a missile attack by the Russian occupiers, which killed at least 39 people. About 100 people were injured, they were operated on by dozens of surgeons at the same time. Russia denied the attack, while LPR and DPR militants called it a 'Ukrainian provocation'.

The New York Times also writes about the attack on the train station, recalling that the Ukrainian authorities are trying to evacuate people from the Donetsk region.

'The strike continued Russia's indiscriminate bombing, which devastated cities such as Kharkiv and Mariupol', the newspaper stated.

Among the world's leading media outlets covering this tragedy was CNN that quoted the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell.

Photo: Getty Images

'I strongly condemn this morning’s indiscriminate attack against a train station in Kramatorsk', wrote Josep Borrell on Twitter. 'This is yet another attempt to close escape routes for those fleeing this unjustified war and cause human suffering'.

Fifth package of sanctions against Russia: how much Kremlin to lose

Reuters reports that the EU officially approved a fifth package of sanctions against Russia on April 8, including a ban on imports of coal and chemicals.

The ban on coal imports will take effect in the second week of August. No new contracts can be signed from April 8. Existing contracts should be terminated by the second week of August. The ban on coal is €8 billion a year of lost revenue for Russia.

Many Russian ships and trucks have also been banned from entering the EU and all operations with four Russian banks, including VTB.

In addition to coal, the new sanctions impose an embargo on imports from Russia of many other goods: wood, rubber, cement, fertilizers, high-end seafood and spirits. The loss is estimated at €5.5 billion a year.

The EU has limited exports to Russia of aviation fuel, quantum computers, advanced semiconductors, high-quality electronics, software, sensitive machinery and transport equipment for a total value of €10 billion a year.

Sanctions forbid Russian companies from participating in public procurement in the EU and extend bans on the use of cryptocurrencies.

Another 217 people have been added to the EU's blacklist as part of a new package of sanctions.

Greetings to Stalin: filtration camps for citizens of Mariupol

In addition to the Kramatorsk topic, CNN also published an investigation into the forcible deportations of people from Mariupol by the occupiers, citing real stories of city residents about 'filtration camps'.

Since the beginning of the war, about 45,000 Ukrainian citizens have been forcibly deported. At the same time, they are initially forced to pass through the camps, as occupiers are trying to identify all potential witnesses to the occupiers’ atrocities and destroy them.

'The practice has stirred painful memories of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin's forced deportation of millions from their homelands, including more than 230,000 Crimean Tatars, to remote parts of the Soviet Union during World War II', said in the newspaper.

Russian troops also used "filtration camps" during the war in Chechnya in the 1990s, where torture, hostage-taking and extrajudicial killings were documented.

Go to Russia or die

Photo: Getty Images

A CNN investigation into the deportations found that people were given only two options: go to Russia or die.

45-year-old Andriy says that after the news about the occupiers and 'LPR' and 'DPR' militants entering the city on March 17, he and his neighbors fled from their shelter and ran to a checkpoint near the sea.

There, soldiers of the so-called 'DPR' ordered the men to undress to the waist: they searched men for 'tattoos', checked their passports, and then took them in cars to Bezimenne, an occupied city 25 km to the east.

People were not given the opportunity to stay in Ukraine, although they were asked where they wanted to go. On March 21, Andriy was taken to Dokuchaevsk, 104 km north of the Donetsk region, to a 'filtration center' where Ukrainians were treated.

His fingerprints were taken, he was photographed, his phone was searched and his contacts were downloaded. Two days later he was taken south to Novoazovsk, and then across the border to Russia.

On the morning of March 24, Andriy was taken by bus to Taganrog to a refugee center, from where he reached Voronezh, where he is now staying with his mother-in-law.

Free will out of question

Photo: Getty Images

According to Andriy, at the Taganrog railway station, he saw Ukrainians without money or documents, forcibly deported to Penza, almost 1,000 km to the northeast. Andriy now wants to return from Voronezh to Ukraine, possibly through Belarus.

'Some people in Ukraine may think that those who left for Russia are traitors. But we had no choice -- we had only one road, this was to Novoazovsk', he said.

Human rights activist Svetlana Gannushkina, who runs a refugee organization in Moscow, confirmed that she had received dozens of requests for help from Ukrainians stranded in cities across Russia.

'These are people who find themselves between two fires in a completely terrible situation', Gannushkina said. 'There is no question of free will here'.

Kicked out of bunker, interrogated all night

Photo: zaxid.net

Anna, 24, says she has been living in a bunker for two weeks, hiding in the northern suburbs of Mariupol with her family when soldiers stormed inside.

'They came in and said, 'It's an order: Women and children have to leave'.

All of the women and children were forced out -- about 90 in total, including her mother, teenage brother, grandmother, aunt and her aunt's two children.

Anna was taken by bus to a nearby town, where she was interrogated by 'police officers' of the so-called 'DPR' during the night. On March 16, they were sent to Bezimenne, and then to a 'registration camp'.

'They photograph you from all angles, for facial recognition I suspect. Next you give them your fingerprints and, strangely, palm prints. I don't know why', Anna said. 'After that they enter your details in the database. The next stage you go in for questioning'.

Interrogations about Azov, 'DPR'

Photo: koniukhov.com.ua

People were interrogated about their politics, attitudes towards the DPR and Russian authorities. Questions included information about relatives serving in the Azov battalion.

Then the people were forcibly taken to the Russian border, where the woman was given a migration card and a voucher for 10,000 rubles (about $ 100). There were interrogations at the border again.

'We were treated like criminals, being held as the property of the Russian Federation. I didn't feel we were free to leave', she said.

Police accompanied their bus to Taganrog, where they were dropped off at a train station. Those who had no family or friends in Russia were sent to Vladimir, a city almost 1,000 km to the east. Anna's aunt and children were taken there.

Anna, her mother, grandmother and brother escaped to Rostov, because they have friends there, from there Anna went to Moscow, then to St. Petersburg and finally on March 22, to Estonia.

«Ukrainian authorities don't give a damn about you»

21-year-old Dmytro moved to Mariupol only in February 2022. Less than a month later, militants of the so-called 'DPR' kicked him out from a sports complex-turned-shelter.

'They said, 'We're taking over the building. Go away for evacuation', but they didn't say where to go. They were smiling and we had to smile back to stay safe, no one wanted to have problems', he said.

Later, at a checkpoint with the letter Z, people were told that they could be taken to Russia and that the Ukrainians would not help them.

'Nobody will evacuate you. Ukrainian authorities don't give a damn about you', Dmytro recalled the soldiers saying.

After camps and interrogations at the border, the student found himself in Taganrog, where he was given a SIM card, food and toiletries for a shower. He did not sleep for 48 hours and was exhausted.

Russian relatives sent Dmitry rubles, he got to Ivangorod, and already on the border with Estonia he was reproached that he does not have a passport.

'If we were taken to Novoazovsk with smiles, then there was already a boorish attitude', he said.

Instead of an afterword. The world, together with Ukraine, continues to gather and be horrified by the evidence and new facts of Russia's war crimes in Ukraine. Europe has tightened sanctions against the bloody regime of Vladimir Putin, and this will have serious consequences for Moscow's economy. Unfortunately, the Kremlin will receive money for coal until August.

CNN's investigation into the filtration camps through which Ukrainians who were forcibly deported from Mariupol is interesting and detailed. People were not even left with a choice of where to go, as humanitarian corridors to Ukrainian-controlled territory were blocked and shelled, and tens of thousands of people were deported to Kremlin lands. There they also had little choice: either to assimilate or to look for ways to leave, often without money and documents.

Anyway, the fact that the world media is actively covering the atrocities committed by the Russians in our territories gives hope that all crimes will be investigated and the perpetrators will be punished in one way or another. Ukraine has been fighting for its right to exist for 44 days.