Who actually attacked a jail of POWs?

On the morning of July 29, simply hours after greater than 50 Ukrainian prisoners of battle had been killed at a detention center within the Donetsk area, a Russian reporter on the scene displayed remnants of a US-made HIMARS rocket.

It was the start of a full-court Russian media offensive, with a message as cynical because it was brutal. Ukraine, in response to Moscow’s model of occasions, had killed its personal troopers with a HIMARS strike as a result of it didn’t need them confessing to battle crimes, and to discourage others from surrendering.

A senior official of the self-declared Russian-backed Donetsk Individuals’s Republic (DPR), Eduard Basurin, claimed that “after the Ukrainian prisoners of battle started to speak in regards to the crimes they dedicated on the orders of the political authorities of Ukraine, a blow was struck right here.”

Ukraine vehemently denied the claims, with President Volodymyr Zelensky calling the assault “a deliberate battle crime by the Russians.”

Most of the prisoners within the Olenivka detention heart belonged to the nationalist Azov Regiment. They’d been transferred there after surrendering on the Azovstal metal plant in Mariupol in Might. Azov is viscerally loathed by the Russians, and the sensation is mutual.

However would Ukraine goal its personal troopers — many thought to be heroes for his or her resistance at Azovstal — whilst they slept?

A CNN investigation primarily based on evaluation of video and pictures from the scene, satellite tv for pc imagery from earlier than and after the assault and the work of forensic and weapons consultants concludes the Russian model of occasions could be very possible a fabrication. There may be virtually no likelihood {that a} HIMARS rocket precipitated the harm to the warehouse the place the prisoners had been being held.

Consultants consulted by CNN low cost a HIMARS strike on Olenivka — however can’t say definitively what killed and wounded so many prisoners. A scarcity of entry makes definitive conclusions not possible. Nonetheless, consultants say most indicators level to an intense fireplace, and in response to a number of witnesses there was no sound of an incoming rocket.

Olenivka, the place the detention heart is positioned, is within the a part of the Donetsk area which has been held by pro-Russian forces for eight years.

The morning after the blast, Andrey Lazarev, who works for the Russian Protection Ministry’s Zvezda channel, pointed to neatly organized fragments, one in all which included the serial variety of a HIMARS rocket in remarkably good situation — regardless of an intense fireplace that had charred our bodies.

Russian Protection Ministry spokesman Main Normal Igor Konashenkov continued that narrative, saying the detention heart was “hit by a missile assault from the American HIMARS.”

The HIMARS — a long-range and extremely correct rocket system — has been provided to the Ukrainian army by the US.

Earlier strikes involving HIMARS rockets have left craters evident on satellite tv for pc imagery, together with in depth harm. These pictures present the affect of a Ukrainian HIMARS strike earlier in July that destroyed a warehouse in Nova Kakhovka.

A lot much less destruction is clear in satellite tv for pc imagery of the assault on the Olenivka warehouse on July 29.

A number of weapons consultants informed CNN pictures and video from Olenivka had been incompatible with a HIMARS assault.

Weapons skilled Chris Cobb-Smith, who reviewed pictures and video of the aftermath, says the constructing, a warehouse with skinny partitions and steel roof, wouldn’t have been left standing by a HIMARS strike.

“There isn’t any crater anyplace in these movies, the beds didn’t transfer, pillars are undamaged, however there may be huge fireplace harm seen. If it was a guided a number of launch rocket system, you’d see craters, ceilings and partitions shattered, our bodies blown up,” Cobb-Smith mentioned.

“There may be little if any signal of serious blast harm to both the construction or to the our bodies. The harm would appear to be precipitated overwhelmingly by an in depth and intensive fireplace. A lot of the harm to the roof additionally appears to be attributable to it falling in somewhat than being impacted by the trajectory of a munition or by a blast impact.”

Cobb-Smith additionally famous that “the HIMARS remnants weren’t photographed in situ, which is odd. A primary component of any investigation can be gathering visible proof of the stays of munitions the place they had been discovered.”

US officers have additionally discounted the notion {that a} HIMARS was used. One official informed CNN: “This was positively not a HIMARS.”

One other Western official informed CNN, “It is clear to our explosive consultants that this wasn’t a excessive explosive strike from the skin. It is more likely to be incendiary, and from inside the situation.”

A number of analysts additionally informed CNN it might have made little sense for Ukraine to make use of a HIMARS rocket if it needed to hit the constructing. The situation is a few 15 kilometers (round 9 miles) from the frontline; the HIMARS is an costly weapon used for longer-range concentrating on. It could even have been extra traceable than Ukraine’s massive shares of Soviet-era rockets.

A NATO official informed CNN that “[HIMARS] is just not designed for that [close targeting]. Just like the howitzer, it’s designed for lengthy vary, as artillery. It is not sensible for it [HIMARS] for use that approach. The Ukrainians produce other weapons for these brief distances.”

An incoming missile or rocket, definitely one such because the HIMARS, would have been heard. However a number of accounts say there was no such noise.

Inna Zatolaka, the mom of 1 POW held at Olenivka, informed CNN that troopers “didn’t hear the hit of a rocket.”

It’s unclear if Zatolaka’s son continues to be alive. She is in contact with different moms of POWs who’ve heard from their sons because the strike.

“The fellows had been in Azovstal for fairly a very long time and perceive the way it sounds. What our sons mentioned was that they didn’t even hear the hit. They didn’t hear the explosion. It appears to be like like only a fireplace began.”

The Ukrainian safety service, the SBU, launched a purported intercept of two DPR militia talking in regards to the assault the day after it occurred. One says: “There have been no indicators of typical incoming of shell or one thing — no whistle sound, nothing.”

As a substitute, he says, three explosions had been heard on the facility. “Likely, they’ve planted an explosion inside upfront.”

CNN can not verify the veracity of the intercept and was not given entry to the unique recording.

Consultants informed CNN that the accessible proof suggests a sudden and intense fireplace inside the constructing. They be aware that in response to DPR officers, no guards had been injured.

Janes, a protection intelligence group, informed CNN that “there may be virtually no signal of injury from ‘fragmentation’ on the inner partitions and the tin roof (though bent, the latter doesn’t appear to have important holes made by shrapnel).”

“There are indicators of extraordinarily excessive temperature contained in the constructing, however other than a portion of the tin roof, there is no such thing as a structural harm,” the Janes evaluation mentioned.

Ukrainian officers imagine the fierce fireplace contained in the warehouse was attributable to a thermobaric weapon. The Prosecutor Normal’s workplace, which is consulting worldwide consultants, informed CNN that assessments revealed up to now “fairly refute the model of the Russians that our Armed Forces launched a rocket assault on the place of detention of prisoners and in addition verify our model about using thermobaric weapons.”

A thermobaric weapon is basically a vacuum bomb, sucking all of the oxygen out of the air and producing very excessive warmth in a short time. Russian forces have already used such weapons within the Ukraine battle. Considered one of them, the RPO-A Shmel, releases a risky explosive cloud that combusts within the air and creates a fireball of excessive thermal power over an space of a number of sq. meters. It basically kills by way of excessive strain — inflicting inside hemorrhaging and ruptured inside organs.

CNN can’t confirm Ukraine’s evaluation.

Cobb-Smith says that whereas theoretically a thermobaric weapon may have been used, it is perhaps “one thing a lot easier.”

“It does look as if the hearth was fast in addition to in depth because it seems some people had been nonetheless of their beds.”

Professor Benjamin Ondruschka, a German pathologist who labored on investigations into battle crimes within the Kyiv suburb of Bucha, says that solely full autopsies would reveal the reason for demise, however the pictures counsel a fireplace of a minimum of 300 levels Celsius (572 levels Fahrenheit) and possibly twice that.

“As a forensic skilled, plainly one thing exploded shut by to the very burned individuals, leading to a detonation, leading to a fireplace,” he mentioned.

Simply days earlier than the assault, proof signifies that Russian guards, who took command of the Olenivka heart in mid-Might, moved dozens of the Ukrainian POWs to the warehouse within the “industrial zone” of the compound from the primary cell blocks.

It’s not identified why however the primary blocks had turn out to be overcrowded.

Within the purported DPR militia intercept, one of many audio system says: “There have been 200 individuals in there. The day earlier than yesterday they had been transferred from the barracks, from three barracks.”

And the spouse of a POW informed CNN that two days earlier than the assault some Azov fighters had been transferred to the warehouse — “exactly those that had been harmful and tried to insurgent,” she mentioned.

Water tanks had been put in outdoors the warehouse after July 27, in response to satellite tv for pc imagery. They seem on movies from July 29, the morning after the assault.

The Russians appear very reluctant to offer entry to impartial investigators or worldwide businesses to the positioning. On July 31, three days after the assault, the Russian Protection Ministry mentioned that “within the pursuits of conducting an goal investigation,” it had “formally invited consultants from the UN and the Worldwide Committee of the Pink Cross.”

Farhan Haq, Deputy Spokesman for the Secretary-Normal, informed CNN in a Tuesday assertion that the UN has “obtained requests from each side to conduct an investigation into the matter,” and that they’re “contemplating whether or not the circumstances are in place that would it not make it attainable for the UN to hold out such an investigation.”

In the meantime, the ICRC, which was closely concerned within the unique switch of the prisoners from Azovstal to Olenivka, says a number of requests to go to the positioning have gone unanswered.

Almost per week after the occasion, the ICRC mentioned: “Now we have not been granted entry to the POWs affected by the assault nor do we’ve got safety ensures to hold out this go to.”

For now, there are solely indications of what might have occurred. And given the Russians’ promotion of the implausible HIMARS state of affairs, these indications level to an elaborate however clumsy false flag effort.

The Russians seem to have laid groundwork to assist their model of occasions. Russian battle reporters had been allowed entry to Olenivka within the days earlier than the assault.

Following the incident, one in all them, Alexander Kots, mentioned: “After I had interviews with the Azov Nazis, the place they confessed to quite a few murders of civilians, one query instantly arose: How was Kyiv going to disavow this?”

“And it turned out, it was fairly easy. Zelensky merely gave the order to execute them. The bloodthirsty clown …” he continued.

Among the wounded Ukrainians had been interviewed by DPR media in hospital the day after the assault. One was requested a few Ukrainian strike towards the warehouse.

“If that is true, then why was such a nasty deed achieved?” a visibly distressed soldier mentioned.

“To destroy you,” the reporter replied.

“I might not wish to imagine it, that our [people] needed to destroy us,” the soldier mentioned.

This narrative was later picked up by Russia’s Deputy Protection Minister Alexander Fomin, who mentioned that “the Ukrainian management ordered the missile strike as a result of captured Azov regiment fighters started to offer testimony exposing their crimes, together with towards civilians.”

CNN has been unable to find any such testimony.

Ukrainian officers keep that the Russians additionally determined to stage the assault to cowl up the torture of POWs at Olenivka. Mikhail Podolyak, a senior official in Zelensky’s workplace, mentioned the day after the assault that the Russians needed to “conceal proof of the dimensions of Russia’s rising battle crimes and torture.”

Two Ukrainian officers informed CNN the Olenivka assault got here simply as they anticipated a prisoner swap with Russia. The assault occurred “on the eve of a prisoner trade,” in response to one Ukrainian official who requested to stay nameless as a result of protocol.

Individuals launched from Olenivka, together with support employees who had been held there, say beatings and abuse had been frequent, and that residing circumstances are appalling.

Underneath the Geneva Conventions, interrogation is authorized however “topic to the prohibition of torture and coercion … in addition to the requirement of humane therapy.”

Anna Vorosheva, an support employee allowed to depart Olenivka early in July, mentioned a scarcity of hygiene meant many detainees grew to become sick. Cells designed for 10 individuals contained greater than 50 and there was an acute scarcity of consuming water, she mentioned.

However Vorosheva informed a information convention in Warsaw: “Essentially the most horrible factor was that you possibly can continually hear the sounds of males being crushed, their pleas to cease this torture.”

One other former detainee, Evhen Maliarchuk, informed CNN that he “distinctly heard how prisoners of battle had been introduced there and interrogated, crushed, and crushed very laborious. There have been very scary sounds that did not allow us to sleep.”

CNN has requested the Russian Ministry of Protection about allegations of torture at Olenivka and for touch upon the findings of our investigation, however has not obtained a response.

Maliarchuk, who mentioned he was detained as he tried to evacuate his household from Mariupol, recalled that in a single occasion “after interrogating and beating a person, [guards] compelled him to crawl up the steps after which down the hall to his room.”

A driver who was launched, Kostiantyn Velickho, wouldn’t give particulars about what had occurred for the sake of these nonetheless held however mentioned: “We needed to see what these individuals do to prisoners of battle. We noticed it with our personal eyes.”

The detention heart at Olenivka has been reduce off from the skin world since late Might. With each passing day, hope of gaining insights into what has actually occurred there, each earlier than and because the horrific deaths of greater than 50 prisoners of battle, step by step fades.