President Volodymyr Zelenskyy believes the provocations in Petropavlivska Borshchahivka, when a crowd surrounded a building used by the National Guard, were an “orchestrated story”. He drew that conclusion after reviewing the case materials, the president said at a meeting with journalists on 13 November.
He added that law enforcement must provide answers about what happened. But, in his view, everything had been prepared in advance, although there were also ordinary people among those involved.
“Everyone saw the woman who started all this, and had the chance to look at who she is and what her motivation is,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy commented.
Context
In the village of Petropavlivska Borshchahivka, unrest broke out near a house where servicemen from a unit of the National Guard of Ukraine were staying. Law enforcement officers arrived at the scene, and later NGU Commander Oleksandr Pivnenko came. The building housed mobilised personnel and several servicemen who had returned after going AWOL.
A crowd quickly gathered outside the building with the servicemen, as calls to help “injured” mobilised personnel were actively spread on social media. It emerged that the call to the police reporting that access to a citizen was being denied was made by a woman who introduced herself as an ambulance medic, but she was not. The aim was to “extract” one of the servicemen who had returned after going AWOL.
The crowd demanded that the mobilised servicemen on the premises be handed over to them. After being refused, they tried to get inside without authorisation and clashed with law enforcement. Some people behaved aggressively, including towards Commander Pivnenko. The head of the President’s Office, Kyrylo Budanov, came to deal with the situation. Pivnenko took people who said they were relatives of the mobilised personnel into the building and showed them that there was no “torture chamber”, as had been claimed on social media. The conflict continued until late at night.
The woman who posed as an ambulance medic and filed a report alleging people were being tortured in the basement was detained. It emerged that three days before the incident she and a driver had carried out reconnaissance of the area near the house used by the NGU. The same woman had bought an ambulance vehicle in advance and dressed in a medic’s uniform.
Budanov, head of the President’s Office and a general, said that by the time he arrived three cars had already been smashed and a crowd of about 500 people had gathered. He said there had been outside influence on these events.
The 1st NGU Corps condemned the unlawful actions against NGU servicemen, while also warning citizens against obstructing the work of military units.