Iryna: <start cut off> were kept as captured and the parents didn’t have access to their kids, because Russians kept the kids as a like shield against Ukrainian drones and missiles. Because they knew that Ukrainians wouldn’t target them. I don’t have the picture right now because I changed my phones, but there was a playground and they buried a tank- Russians buried a tank underneath a sandbox, and they painted the top of that tank like very bright colours so it wouldn’t be noticeable from the top, from the air. So they just- I mean, they’re monsters. Keeping little kids, little toddlers, a whole bunch of them inside, not letting people- not letting their parents to take care of these kids, and then shoot and target Ukrainian forces at the same time as their kid’s in there. It’s just mind-blowing.
Vic: So they forced the children to attend the school because the Russians were using the school as a base and keeping their equipment there.
Iryna: Yes, yes, they wouldn’t let children out of the school and out of the kindergarten for weeks, until Ukrainians were able to push through the defence line. And then they just had to. So there’s this school, and a kindergarten right across the street from each other. And then probably like 20, 30 meters away across another street, across the intersection, there was another school, but like high school. That was the main Russian headquarters there. All their high military personnel was there, and they didn’t keep any children in there, thankfully. So when Ukraine was taking over Izium, they targeted their headquarters and killed a whole bunch of Russian commanders. That forced Russians to withdraw their troops and they just left all the kids in the school, and they just left all their tanks that were buried underground. They did that so that- they buried their tanks to use them, so that Ukrainians wouldn’t know that there’s tanks there, because it’s not visible, right? So they abandoned everything and left those schools and kindergartens, thankfully. So, not a lot of children were hurt.
Vic: So they didn’t take the children back to Russia with them?
Iryna: Thankfully not. They were barely… they could barely make it out of Izium because Ukraine was pushing really, really, hard, so they were scared for their lives. They didn’t really care about anybody else.
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