TODAY marks two years since Russian troops seized a small village in eastern Ukraine, forcing its population into a tiny cellar where they would live – and die – in cramped, dark and filthy conditions for just under a month.
The Sunday National was able to speak with Ivan Polhui, the head of Yahidne village council, through an intermediary, to highlight one of the most shocking stories of the Ukraine war, which entered its third year last month.
Yahidne is a tiny village in the Chernihiv Oblast, bordering both Russia and Belarus. On March 3, 2022, Russian troops entered the village, beginning an occupation which would shock the world.
Polhui, 63, described how Russian soldiers forced more than 365 people into the basement of the local school. The room measures around 190 square metres, he said.
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“There was extremely little space, it was impossible to lie down, only to sit,” said Polhui.
They lived in stifling conditions, he added, rarely being allowed to leave the basement. When they were, it was at great personal risk as missiles flew overhead, said Polhui.
“It was incredibly stuffy, despite the fact that it should be cold in the basement, it was very hot.
“We were hardly allowed to go outside to breathe fresh air, and when we were, it was under fire and missile strikes and as a result some people were injured.”
They had “no hope” they would survive the ordeal and 10 died in the basement “due to lack of oxygen and food”, said Polhui. The oldest captive was 90 years old, the youngest just one month.
“When one of the babies fell ill, due to lack of air and food, the woman asked to take him out to the yard to breathe so that she would not die, the Russians replied, ‘If she will die so she will die’,” said Polhui.
He added that some children caught smallpox while they were kept captive: “But there was no medicine, and to any request to the ‘Rashists’ to provide at least some medicine, people only heard the answer ‘no’.”
The dead lay among the living and bodies were eventually passed out for burial, Polhui said.
“People’s bodies were taken out and simply buried in the forest as if it were normal,” he added.
According to reports at the time, they were kept in the basement as human shields as Russian troops fought to conquer Ukraine.
The hostages were freed on March 30, when Ukraine retook the village after forcing the Russians out.
But the memory of the event will not leave those who lived through it – and is likely to be remembered down the generations as one of the enduring symbols of Russian brutality in the conflict.
“In fact, people want to forget, but it is impossible to forget,” said Polhui.
“It is necessary that our children remember this, although our children will not forget it either, our descendants will remember it.
“So that the whole world knew how the Russians kept us in the basement and knew what kind of humans they are, what they represent, that they are inhuman.”
But their liberation is cold comfort as the battle against Russia continues – amid mounting frustration in Ukraine over the West’s waning interest in the conflict. Focus has been diverted by the catastrophe in Gaza and there is growing uncertainty about America’s continued support for Volodymyr Zelenskyy if Donald Trump is re-elected as president.
“Now people are still living in fear because the war is not over, it continues,” Polhui said.
“People are avoiding the basement. It is very difficult to remember those events. We had no hope that we would get out of this basement alive.
“When we were freed, we were infinitely happy, because we no longer believed that we would get out of this basement. Some of us never made it.”
Ira Martseva, a foreign relations official at the Chernihiv Regional State Administration, contributed reporting to this article
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