“The first brigade of Russian forces that came in were more or less tolerable,” Volkova said. “They said, ‘OK, we will help you.’ ”
That help, Volkova explained, was just allowing them to pull corpses off the streets. She added that roughly 20 people had been killed during the occupation and the ensuing fighting — 10 had suffered gunshot wounds.
On a few occasions, the Russian troops opened “green corridors” for civilians to leave the town, although that was when some people — mostly younger, military-age men — were abducted.
Early in the occupation, Trostyanets’ police officers took off their uniforms and blended into the populace. Those who were in Ukraine’s Territorial Defense, the equivalent of the National Guard, slipped out to the town’s periphery and worked as partisans — documenting Russian troop movement and reporting it to the Ukrainian military.
Others remained in the town, quietly moving to help residents when they could, even as Russian soldiers hunted them. “We were here during the whole time of occupation, working to the best of our abilities,” explained the police chief, Volodymyr Bogachyov, 53.
As the days and weeks went by, food became scarce, and any goodwill from the soldiers vanished, too. Residents boiled snow for water and lived off what they had stored from their small gardens. Russian soldiers, without a proper logistics pipeline, began looting people’s homes, shops and even the local chocolate factory. One butcher spray-painted “ALREADY LOOTED” on his shop so the soldiers would not break in. On another store, another deterrence: “EVERYTHING IS TAKEN, NOTHING LEFT.”
By mid-March, the Russian soldiers were rotated out of the town and replaced by separatist fighters who were brought in from the southeast.
It was then, residents said, that atrocities began to mount.
“They were brash and angry,” Volkova said. “We could not negotiate with them about anything. They would not give us any green corridors; they searched the apartments, took away the phones, abducted people — they took them away, mostly young men, and we still don’t know where these people are.”
