The Bombing Of Civilians In Lugansk By The Kyiv Government *Graphic*– Behind Ukraine’s Walls of Fire (IV)

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OEUROPE, REVOLUTION NEWS, UKRAINE

Inna Kukurudza was in the center of Lugansk, talking on the phone with her daughter, when she was bombed by an aircraft of the Kyiv government, June 2, 2014. The airstrike hit a public building, which came under the control of the anti-Kyiv population a month ago. It also hit a nearby park. 

This is the testimony of the daughter of Inna Kukurudza. Her mother was bombed in the city of Lugansk by a war plane of the Kyiv government, on June 2, 2014 – a month after the Odessa massacre. 8 passers-by in the mostly Russian speaking city were killed and 20 wounded in the bombing,which targeted a public building under the control of the anti-Kyiv population. This, among many others, was a crime against humanity committed by the government in Kyiv for which they must be prosecuted by the Hague tribunal, according to the Geneva conventions, even if such acts do not constitute a violation of the domestic law of the country in which they were committed (see note* at the end of the blog).

The government in Kyiv has been killing civilians in the east since March. Under the pretext of an imaginary war with Russia, they are pursuing their ultra-reactionary “national revolution,” which aims at getting their fatherland free of “occupants” and “Moskali,” as they call the Russian speaking population in the east. To pursue this agenda, the neo-nazis who control state armed forces are building themselves a separate 60,000 army – which will be under their control and which will be used to  command state power. The massacres of civilian population in Ukraine, praisedby the West, are just beginning. Under their cover, the government can also maintain a state of emergency in Ukraine, which they need so that the IMF is not met with any resistance to their brutal capitalist accumulation, a.k.a “structural adjustment.”

 “I live in Lugansk. Today a tragedy came to our family.

I was talking to my mother on the phone when two big fighter airplanes flew over the cinema Ukraina and over the state administration building.

The airplanes circled above, one over my head, one over my mother’s head, then flew away…

The one over the city center flew over my head, then over the movie theater and turned to the city center…

It flew over the state administration building where my mom was looking over the lists of the wounded.

I heard a rumbling sound and saw the airplane shooting a volley of automatic gunfire.

The airplanes left dark stripes in the sky, three or four stripes.

The moment the war plane launched the airstrike against the city of Lugansk, June 2 2014. Capture from thisvideo.

This is the moment when the city center of Lugansk was hit by the projectiles fired by the Ukrainian war plane. Source

The phone conversation with my mom broke, I realized the shell hit the city, the city center.

I ran to my car and drove there.

Militia tried to stop me, they said the airplanes were still circling and there would be another attack.

But I forced my way through.

As you will see in the video, mom asked for help.

It was horrible. Many people died.

The ground floor was heavily damaged, a shell hit there.

Another shell hit the second floor, and another hit the third.

There were big holes in the ground all over the park, shell craters.

Shell fragments lay all over the place.

Today is June 2, 2014.

My mom died on the way to the hospital.”

Her mom was Inna Vladimirovna Kukurudza, 48 years old, a social worker. She was a human being who believed incompassion. She was murdered by the contract killers of politicians who later met “world leaders” and joked and laughed and made more deals for military contracts – to kill more people like her.  She was not a real person to the government of Kyiv, she was a “Putinist” and “a terrorist” because she voted against them in a local referendum on May 11, and because she is an ethnic Russian. The government in Kyiv have a licence to kill civilians in the east of Ukraine because the Western totalitarian leaders have many lies to hide – worst of them being that they backed neo-nazis to power during the power reshuffle back in February. Their EuroMaidan was a huge propaganda operation, which pushed people who are connected to neo-nazi organizations to power.

Inna Vladimirovna Kukurudza was one of the 8 civilians killed by the government of Kyiv on June 2, 2014 in a bombardment against the city of Lugansk.

All the people killed in the airstrike against the public administration building in the center of Lugansk were civilians, most of them were women. People injured inside the building almost burned alive in a fire that started after the bombing.

At seconds 0:03, 0:05, 0:08, 0:12, 0:15, 0:23, 0:27 in this video, you can see repeated cannon fire then at 0:22 another projectile being fired over the city center of Lugansk. This proves that this airstrike was not unintentional, or a mistake, it was deliberate.

This video captured the destruction inside the building.

When medics took her to the hospital, Inna was still breathing; she died on the way there. These are six videos whichcaptured the aftermath of the bombardment by the government of Kyiv against the city of Lugansk. They are among the few which were not deleted by youtube. Yet.

These are the civilians some mainstream media in the west are not keen on talking about. While this crime against humanity was committed by the Kyiv government against the people of Lugansk, at the border there was heavy fighting between the government’s National Guard (Right Sector recruits, indoctrinated and trained by the neo-nazis like Parubiy and Yarosh into believing that the Russian population in the east are “occupants” and “enemies of the nation”) and armed locals in the east; there are mercenaries on both sides, but mainstream media reports only about those on the rebels’ side.

The rebels, called “terrorists” by the government of Kyiv, attacked a border check-point; previously they shot down at least one helicopter. The government launched 150 airstrikes against Lugansk on June 2, 2014, in what they call an “anti-terrorist operation,” ATO, which in fact is brutal military repression against a disobedient population in the Russian speaking dominated east. The government launched airstrikes against the Locomotive Plant in Lugansk. 

The government of Kyiv later reported “mission accomplished” – that meaning that they “wiped out” the rebels. But later it came to light that they actually retreated from the area after the rebels overtook some of their men – it’s not clear if they surrendered on their own or were captured. (On May 22, Kyiv soldiers deployed at a checkpoint in Lugansk surrendered on their own.) There were loses on both sides. The incumbent president of the country — put in this chair after they confiscated state power on February 22, he is to leave office on Sunday when the new oligarch-president Poroshenko will be put in power– said they will consider imposing “martial law” in Lugansk and Donetsk – this means they want a free hand to kill anyone they want with impunity. It will be a full display of state terrorism, which is just beginning in the east of Ukraine. The Kyiv propaganda is urging a total wipe out of the “terrorists” in the east, but they make no distinction between civilians and armed men. Actually, they are not interested in making any.

The person who announced that “ATO” will continue in the east for a long time – and lots of money, 3 million a day – is some hotshot in the presidential administration of Kyiv, and during the EuroMaidan he was caught with automatic riffles in the truck of his car.

Sergei Pashinsky also lied during the local referenda held by the Donbass people; he actually said that “nobody voted” in these referenda (EU’s Catherine Ashton claimed that they lacked “democratic legitimacy” – that meaning their approval, not people voting for what they wanted, defying the threats of the armed thugs of the government of Kyiv). However, on May 25th, an official in Lugansk was murdered by Kyiv’s men because he opposed opening polling stations for the state presidential elections.

These are traces left by the projectiles fired by the war plane of the Kyiv government in the park near the building where 8 passers-by were killed in the bombardment of June 2, 2014.

The pathological liars of the Kyiv government 

For once, the Kyiv government is right: “Terrorists bombed Lugansk,” they claimed. This was their first reaction to the bombardment of Lugansk. Indeed, there were terrorists who bombed Lugansk: the terrorists are those in the government and state armed forces apparatus in Kyiv. They’ve terrorized the population in the east for months now. (Terrorism is imposing a policy or decision by inflicting terror on the civilian population, quite common when the IMF is around). The first reaction of the government in Kyiv seems always to be to blame one’s side for killing their own - this was also their reaction to what they’ve done in Odessa and Mariupol.

The propaganda channels of the Kyiv government accused the rebels – which they call “terrorists” – of killing the civilians in the city they control; local population occupied the building bombed a month ago. They keep denying that a war plane of the Kyiv government bombed the city, in spite of all images which prove the contrary. In Odessa they did the same: they accused the victims they massacred of burning themselves alive.

This is typical of the Kyiv government’s propaganda, which is controlled by the Right Sector – first they said there was no war plane, and that “terrorists” bombed their own; then they said there was no bombing from any aircraft, because “the explosion” occurred inside the public administration building — as ATO spokesperson claimed — ; then they said it was a Russian plane bombing the Russian-speaking population in Lugansk, then they said they did not do it. The Ukrainian media said that the bombing was done by “illegal armed forces” (rebels) who tried to fire at “the Ukrainian air force, but instead hit the window of the building.”

They call the bombing “a fire,” which is pretty much what the mainstream media reported too.

When even OSCE admitted that there was an airstrike, the Kyiv government propaganda claimed they were lying because “the rebels” were holding some of their personnel in captivity. OSCE said, “rockets hit the occupied regional administration building. Based on the SMM’s limited observation these strikes were the result of non-guided rockets shot from an aircraft. The number of casualties is unknown. A number of Luhansk city and region inhabitants tried to escape the combat zone. The SMM learned that trains to Kharkiv and Kyiv appeared to be fully booked for the next couple of days.”

These people are refugees of war - for the simple reason that the government of Kyiv is shelling, firing at them, and killing them for months in Slaviansk,Krasny Liman,Kramatorsk, and again now in Lugansk, after the Kyiv government committed massacres against the civilian populations in Odessa and Mariupol.

The Kyiv propagandists outdid themselves however when they invented the story about the rocket being fired at the building controlled by rebels by an invisible “terrorist” with a RPG on his shoulder, in broad daylight. They argued that on the surveillance camera there can be seen a flame - the moment when the rocket was fired and seconds later the big explosion further down on the street. This is what Yarosh said it happened, and their propaganda channels insist even now that it’s what happened. They invented “a terrorist” who was firing at a building the people of Lugansk took control over a month ago. It made sense to them that rebels bomb the buildings they controlled. Nobody saw this shooter because he did not exist.

What did exist was a war plane of the Kyiv government bombing the city. This war plane was seen by dozens and filmed by some, while it bombed the civilian population of Lugansk. Here are some pics from this video, where you can see clearly it’s not a mistake.

This is the war plane which bombed Lugansk on June 2, 2014.

This is another video of the war plane bombing the city center of Lugansk:

This video records the shelling during the night that followed after the bombing of the city center of Lugansk on June 2:

The pics below are taken from the images recorded by a surveillance camera- they recorded different moments in time when different projectiles hit the city center. Kyiv propaganda said the flame at the second 0:36 was “proof” that a rocket from a RPG was fired by an invisible man in the park – he must be invisible because nobody saw him. In fact 0:36 was the moment when the first projectile hit the park. Then others hit.

There were more projectiles fired in this area by the Kyiv government airplane –  their moment of impact is different in time. The person who filmed the video we posted above filmed at least 8 rounds of fire – among one is a rocket. It took 23 seconds to fire them – that video is not edited. It does not mean this is all that the war plane fired – it is only what has been filmed.

On the images captured by the surveillance camera in the center of Lugansk, you can also see more projectiles – falling at different moments in time — , which is consistent with the canon fire by the Ukrainian government airplane.  

CNN talked to an expert who said that ”whatever detonations hit the building and the adjoining park came from the air. The tops of trees were splintered, and a series of small craters — about a dozen — had been blasted in a straight line, starting in the park and reaching the walls of the building, blowing out many of its windows and spraying the area with jagged shrapnel. That’s what appears to have killed most of the victims and injured 20 more. The pattern of the craters clearly indicated some sort of strafing, according to a munitions expert at the scene with CNN. Their size suggested 30-millimeter ordinance, he said, which is standard equipment on the Su-25, a ground attack fighter, and the Su-27 — both combat aircraft operated by Ukraine.” Source 

The next day after they bombed civilians in the center of Lugansk, the United States promised more “military help” for Kyiv, which is planning to impose martial law in Donetsk and Lugansk – that is, getting a free hand at killing.

Anyone contradicting the self-victimizing propaganda of the aggressor Kyiv government, or if you dare look at facts, you must know they will immediately say that it is “Russian propaganda” – because for them reality and facts are only those they can use to pursue more death in the east – their nazis post on their pages calls to “burn the Moskali, and kill them in the name of jesus christ,” and express joy at the thought of exterminating the civilian population in the east. There is armed resistance against them  in the east, but these most of these fighters are locals who took up arms after Kyiv announced they would use military might against them; it is not them executing children and passers-by in Slaviansk. The Kyiv government has attacked the civilian population with tanks, helicopters, and have shot civilians in their cars on their way home, at their balcony for looking at them, and they have shelled schools, hospitals, factories, they have bombed peasants’ homes in villages. (Just a reminder: the “European values promoters” nazis in the government of Kyiv had guns at EuroMaidan since December 2013, as it was admitted publicly by their cult leader Yarosh.)

The Kyiv government needs to be seen as “the victim” – this is why they attack anyone pointing facts at them. They need to be pictured in the public opinion in the West as “victims”, while they constantly incite crimes against the Russian speaking population in the east. They even expressed joy at the massacre their nazis committed in Odessa on May 2, 2014, and fascist Svoboda politicians have called for all of the Russian speaking population be shot -  see what we blogged about the Odessa massacre.

They have been killing civilians at large in the east, but the attack in Lugansk has been documented and it shows their real agenda in this “pacification” operation in the east, which they also use as pretext to build a separate 60,000 strong army under the control of nazis like Yarosh and Parubiy and the head of the SBU, the secret service of Ukraine.

This is Aleksander Ott, from Starovarvarivka village, watching his wife’s grave being dug, next to their child. Lena and their son, Pavel, were killed by the Ukrainian government armed forces who fired at them in their car. It is not known how many people were just executed like this by the armed thugs of the Kyiv government in the east, but it is known that, except some mercenaries, most armed fighters against Kyiv are residents of Eastern Ukraine – peasants, workers, and more and more women. Read more about how the government of Ukraine destroyed Alekdander Ott’s family on Al Jazeera‘s site.

 Media covering up for the Kyiv killings 

Read it all here: “No doubt the BBC considered that by reporting both claims it was being even-handed, but even a minimal amount of fact-checking would have allowed it to determine which claim was objectively correct.

The Guardian newspaper did not even attempt to present two sides to the story. It repeated the government claim that rebels had killed the civilians with an anti-aircraft missile and omitted any information about aircraft.

North American media were barely interested in the story.

Close observation of recent Western reporting on Ukraine reveals a clear pattern: when the Ukrainian government or its supporters kill civilians, this is consistently downplayed or ignored. When incidents are reported at all, the media’s framing obscures agency and thus responsibility for what has happened. Such reporting causes the public to view international events through a distorted lens, which contributes to the production of foreign policy based on ignorance.” Source

 “The intervention of the US and EU imperialist powers is a highly dangerous provocation from the point of view of the genuine interests, not only of all Ukrainians but also of the workers and middle classes of Europe and North America. It is part of their more general policy of an aggressive militarized offensive against their Russian imperialist rival. Although Russia is much weaker in all respects than the USA and, economically, weaker than the EU, Western policy has allowed Putin to pose as the defender of the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine. However, their interests are completely subordinate to his strategic goal, which is to maintain a buffer between Russian territory and NATO’s already advanced front line. If Eastern Ukrainians put their fate in his hands, they are heading for catastrophe.” read more, here: “Counterrevolution and resistance in Ukraine”

“The people in Ukraine who are suffering due to the current conflict between the opposing forces are getting stuck in the crossfire of nationalist militarism. The only people who stand to benefit from such a situation are oligarchs and far-right extremists on both sides.“ –  read it all here: “Ukraine: Anti-Fascism Not Russian Nationalism | Insights on the Donetsk Situation and the Crisis in Ukraine — Political profiles of the Donetsk Movement of the Donetsk People’s Republic”.

Also this:  “The Left Opposition consistently downplays the right wing nationalist character of the forces in the Kyiv regime, demanding recognition of its “legitimacy” and painting its opponents as Russian separatists, if not agents of Putin.”

* Geneva conventions:

“Article 6.

The Tribunal established by the Agreement referred to m Article 1 hereof for the trial and punishment of the major war criminals of the European Axis countries shall have the power to try and punish persons who, acting in the interests of the European Axis countries, whether as individuals or as members of organizations, committed any of the following crimes.

The following acts, or any of them, are crimes coming within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal for which there shall be individual responsibility:

(a) CRIMES AGAINST PEACE: namely, planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression, or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances, or participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of any of the foregoing;

(b) WAR CRIMES: namely, violations of the laws or customs of war. Such violations shall include, but not be limited to, murder, ill-treatment or deportation to slave labor or for any other purpose of civilian population of or in occupied territory, murder or ill-treatment of prisoners of war or persons on the seas, killing of hostages, plunder of public or private property, wanton destruction of cities, towns or villages, or devastation not justified by military necessity;

(c)CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY: namely, murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against any civilian population, before or during the war; or persecutions on political, racial or religious grounds in execution of or in connection with any crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, whether or not in violation of the domestic law of the country where perpetrated.

Leaders, organizers, instigators and accomplices participating in the formulation or execution of a common plan or conspiracy to commit any of the foregoing crimes are responsible for all acts performed by any persons in execution of such plan.”

Aftermath of the bombardment of the city of Lugansk by the Kyiv government forces.