Mass grave exposes Russia’s coverup of civilian casualties after attack on Kakhovka dam

Over a month has passed since the explosion of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant, but what exactly is happening on the occupied east bank of Kherson Oblast, how many people have died and gone missing, remains unknown.

On June 21, the occupation "authorities" reported 41 dead throughout the Russian-controlled part of Kherson Oblast, and the "medical services" reported 121 injured. At the same time, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry’s National Resistance Center reported that, according to preliminary data, more than 500 people died in the town of Oleshky alone. Hundreds of local residents have not yet been contacted by their relatives – and their fate is unknown.

The Russians do not allow international missions to the occupied part of Kherson Oblast and are doing their best to conceal the scale of the disaster: they do not hand over the bodies to relatives, bury the dead in mass graves, and falsify the cause of death.

LIGA.net tried to investigate how the Russians hide the bodies and cover up the traces of their recent crime.

PACKED MORGUES

For at least a week and a half after the explosion of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant, the bodies of the dead were floating in green water right on the flooded streets of the occupied towns and villages. Occupation "rescue services" did not collect them and did not respond to local requests to do so. To the extent possible, the dead were collected by volunteers and relatives of those who drowned. But these were rather isolated cases.

The occupiers started taking away the bodies only towards the end of June. "I don't even know what to call them, but some kind of ‘body-lifters' appeared on the streets. They are wearing ordinary medical masks and rubber aprons, they are packing the bodies in bags, loading them on trucks with trailers and taking them to an unknown destination. They are doing everything to hide the number of victims," says Yaroslav Vasylyev, founder of the Telegram group "Evacuation. Left Bank".

He created the group on the day of the dam explosion, mustered volunteers around him who evacuated several thousand people from the east bank and are delivering humanitarian aid there. His story allows us to reconstruct the overall picture of what happened and is happening in the occupied part of Kherson Oblast.

At first, the Russians took the dead to the morgue in Oleshky. Then the chaos ensued. "There is no clear scheme for the release of these bodies or any approved procedure," says Vasylyev. "Some relatives were given the bodies of their loved ones, others were refused without explanation. Or at first they promised to give them back, and then pretended that it never happened. I don't think even the Russians know what [the decision] depends on."

Yaroslav describes the following case. A few days after the hydroelectric power plant was blown up, their group "Evacuation. Left Bank" received a request to evacuate an elderly couple from Oleshky. The data was passed on to boatmen who were taking the locals out, but the Russians did not allow the boats to enter the street where the house was located. When the boatmen finally arrived, it turned out that the husband of the couple had died. Volunteers took his body to the morgue in Oleshky.

"His daughter came from another town and went to the morgue to pick up and bury her father," Vasylyev recalls. "The Russians agreed at first, telling her to come the next day. She came, and the body was gone – it had been taken to Kalanchak. Other people who came to the morgue in Oleshky for the bodies of their relatives were told by the Russians that they would only give them back for a bribe. They did not pay, so as not to set a precedent. No one knows what happened to the bodies."

Those who did receive the bodies had problems with the documents, namely, with information about the cause of death. "From what I know, some people were given certificates with the cause of death stated as 'heart attack' instead of 'drowning,'" says local activist Olena (her last name is withheld for security reasons – LIGA.net).

"Some of them were refused to be issued any certificate at all," she continues, "There were also cases when the morgue in Oleshky gave relatives the body, told them to bury it, and to come back the next day for a certificate. They came and were told: 'You have already buried your relative. We cannot issue a certificate after the burial'. Moreover, it was not the Russians who did this, but collaborators – collaborators from Kherson were brought to the Oleshky hospital."

A few days after the Russians started collecting the bodies, there was no more room in the morgue in Oleshky. In addition, another problem arose – there is still almost no electricity in the town, and the only generator in the hospital was moved to the intensive care unit.

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According to local residents, the occupiers buried the bodies that were in the morgue in the town cemetery in Oleshky in a common grave, simply wrapped in plastic. "The Russians said that before burying them, they take DNA samples from each body to analyze them so that they can identify the deceased, but I have my doubts that they do that," Olena says.

Bodies found in flooded houses by relatives do not pass through the morgue at all. It goes something like this: the water has risen on the street, a person comes to their house in Oleshky and finds their dead father there. "A photo of the body is taken next to his open passport (if there is one), and then the person simply digs a pit in the yard or, at best, in the cemetery and buries it," says Olena. "It's hot outside, there's no time to get documents, and there's no point in doing so – you won't get them anyway. I know many cases in Hola Prystan where people buried their loved ones right in their yards."

BODIES UNDER THE RUBBLE

Now the Russians continue to collect bodies on the streets of the occupied settlements. They are packed in bags, loaded onto trucks and taken to the morgues of Skadovsk, Henichesk, and Kalanchak. According to Yaroslav Vasylyev, in Kalanchak, the dead are also buried in a mass grave. Of course, there are no records or conclusions about the cause of death.

"We tried to contact our people in Skadovsk and find out where the bodies are being brought to them and what they are doing with them," says Olena. She works with pro-Ukrainian citizens throughout the occupied east bank.

"We have learned little – only that the bodies were brought from Henichesk," says the activist. "Everyone is afraid to say more because there are many FSB officers on the east bank now. They are filtering the people who were evacuated and deleting any references to the fact that they survived the flood from their phones – all the photos of flooded houses and streets and, of course, photos of the dead."

While the Russians are at least somehow collecting the bodies on the streets, no one is trying to get into the destroyed houses – and there are many of them.

"But the fact is that most of the bodies are most likely inside the houses," says Olena. "Before the hydroelectric power plant exploded, the only people left in Oleshky were the elderly, people with limited mobility, and those who held on to their property until the last minute. Most of them could not climb to the roofs during the flood and stayed on the lower floors. There are a lot of destroyed houses in Oleshky – our town almost resembles Bakhmut or Mariupol. For example, we have a street called Shkilna. There is only one house on it now. All the others have collapsed. And how many bodies are in those houses that no one comes to bury?"

Oleksandr Prokudin, the head of the Kherson Oblast Military Administration, said the same thing on national television: "The town of Oleshky is on the verge of a humanitarian catastrophe, and the bodies of the dead remain under the rubble of the houses."

Olena knows many stories of her neighbors and friends who were caring for disabled relatives and were unable to save them when the water came. "Opposite my house in Oleshky, there is an old lady in her 80s," says Olena, "She has a bedridden son. After the hydroelectric power plant was set off, his condition worsened, he was unconscious. When the water started to rise, the old lady asked her friends to take her son to the attic. They did, but he died soon after. I don't know if the old lady was able to bury him. But this is just one case, and there are many more! At best, only doctors know how many people with limited mobility there were in Oleshky."

LISTS OF THE DEAD AND MISSING

The Russians officially reported 41 deaths after the hydroelectric power plant tragedy throughout the occupied territory of Kherson Oblast. On June 28, it became known that 60 more bodies were found in the occupied territories. But, as already noted, according to the National Resistance Center, more than 500 people died in Oleshky alone. Volunteers are trying to keep lists of the dead and include only those who have been verified.

"We make lists, but we include only those whose relatives have written to us that the person is definitely dead," says Yaroslav Vasylyev. "Every day I post in the group asking people to report to me the facts of death. But, unfortunately, few people respond. If a close relative has died, it is clear that people are not in the mood to write to the group. So now we have only about two dozen names on our lists. I don't have direct evidence to say that there are hundreds of victims, but I'm sure it's true."

In the first five days after the hydroelectric power plant explosion, Yaroslav communicated almost around the clock with local residents and those who helped evacuate the east bank. Every day, dozens of people from different settlements between Oleshky and Hola Prystan told him what they had seen with their own eyes – a lot of bodies floating in the water. It was so shocking that some boatmen refused to return to work after one such day, refusing to help with the evacuation.

"In addition to the lists of the dead, we also have lists of the missing – those who have not yet contacted their loved ones and about whom nothing is known. There are about 400 such people now," says Yaroslav. "But it is also difficult to update them, because relatives have to write to us that the person has been found or that he or she has died. And not everyone does. We are also constantly reviewing the lists of temporary accommodation centers that the Russians have set up on the non-flooded part of the east bank – they are announced in social media groups. If we find the names of the missing from our list there, we cross them out."

There are also cases that are not included in any lists: there were cases when Yaroslav's group received requests from relatives to evacuate several people to a certain address. The address was passed on to the boatmen, and they either could not get there or arrived when the people were no longer there. "We don't know where they went. But until we have verified information that they have been found or died, we cannot put them on any lists," Yaroslav explains.

Back on June 19, Russia rejected the UN's request to allow a humanitarian mission to the flooded part of the east bank. This means that it will be possible to estimate at least the approximate scale of the number of dead only after the de-occupation of this territory and the exhumation of the bodies. According to Yaroslav, his group could have made such an estimate if the Russians had not obstructed the evacuation.  

"We would have organized everything clearly – we would have set up coordinators on the river banks, brought people by boat to one place and kept lists of evacuees," says Yaroslav. "But the Russians did not allow boats and volunteers, we had to invent new ways every day, and it was all chaotic – just to save as many people as possible. Lists were out of the question in those conditions."

More than three weeks have passed since the explosion of the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant, but what exactly is happening on the occupied east bank of Kherson Oblast, how many people have died and gone missing, remains unknown.

On June 21, the occupation "authorities" reported 41 dead throughout the Russian-controlled part of Kherson Oblast, and the "medical services" reported 121 injured. At the same time, Ukraine’s Defense Ministry’s National Resistance Center reported that, according to preliminary data, more than 500 people died in the town of Oleshky alone. Hundreds of local residents have not yet been contacted by their relatives – and their fate is unknown.

The Russians do not allow international missions to the occupied part of Kherson Oblast and are doing their best to conceal the scale of the disaster: they do not hand over the bodies to relatives, bury the dead in mass graves, and falsify the cause of death.

Liga.net tried to investigate how the Russians hide the bodies and cover up the traces of their recent crime.