DEBALTSEVE, Ukraine – A handful of people stand around a mound of excavated earth, weeping as cemetery workers hastily lower a small coffin into the ground.
It’s not much of a funeral. As soon as the earth settles, the mourners leave in a hurry. The reason for their haste becomes clear ten minutes later, when impacting shells boom across the town.
Eleven year-old Artem and his father were killed by a Grad rocket fired into the centre of town by Russian-backed forces who have surrounded Debaltseve on three sides and constantly bombard its terrified population.
But surprisingly, those few locals who haven’t yet fled the town are more angry with the Ukrainian forces defending it than the Kremlin-backed separatists who have reduced their town to a shadow of its former self.
“I ask the soldiers: ‘Why are you killing our people, why did you destroy our palaces, our houses?’” One woman told the Kyiv Post.
“Soldiers say the town is full of separatists. But where?! Where can you see separatists?! There are no Russians here! There are not any of Putin’s soldiers!” She exclaims.
Ukrainian soldiers nearby hear, but look too weary to argue back. Mostly from towns and villages in Ukraine’s west, they have enough to worry about with the daily struggle to stay alive, huddled in damp makeshift fortifications as firefights rage at checkpoints around the town.
One reason for the lack of trust is the propaganda fed to inhabitants of eastern Ukraine daily by state-controlled Russian news outlets. Another is the propaganda coming out of Kyiv that turns people away from Ukrainian media.
“We never watch Ukrainian news, only Russian, because Ukrainian news is lying,” another woman chimes in.
Her words may not be entirely fair, but she’s also not wrong. Ukrainian officials have repeatedly exaggerated or underplayed events and figures to suit their own political aims.
When a civilian passenger bus in Volnovakha was ripped apart by a rocket fired from separatist-held territory, Ukrainian authorities were quick to label it a deliberate act of terror.
“Savages who have nothing sacred except devalued rubles killed ten civilians on purpose, 14-year-old girl among them,” Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko told the nation on Jan. 14. “16 men and women are wounded, all of them civilians. DPR-LPR (Donetsk People’s Republic-Luhansk People’s Republic) gang and those who support it, provide armament, train and inspire for bloody crimes are guilty of these death.”
All the evidence points to a callously careless attack on a Ukrainian-held checkpoint. Those facts are damning enough to speak for themselves, but in pushing their narrative that all separatist sympathizers are evil incarnate, Ukraine’s government is alienating the very hearts and minds they need to capture most.
“Poroshenko wants an excuse to punish us for the referendum,” an elderly lady says as she limps past. “But we didn’t vote for Russia, we don’t want Russia, we voted against this government.”
The sentiment echoed across Debaltseve is that the people here don’t want any soldiers in their town, Russian, Ukrainian or separatists.
The gaunt and harrowed expressions on many of the soldier’s faces suggest they don’t want to be here either.
Editor’s Note: This article has been produced with support from www.mymedia.org.ua, financially supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark, and implemented by a joint venture between NIRAS and BBC Media Action. Content is independent of the financial donor.
