An officer from the “Skelya” regiment commented on the investigation into the deaths of mobilized soldiers during training exercises
7 July 19:43
YOUTUBE
Following reports of the deaths of conscripts during basic military training in the “Skelya” regiment, Mykola (“Accountant”), an air defense officer with the unit, expressed his views on the causes of some of these incidents and spoke about the unit’s cooperation with the investigation. He made these remarks in an interview with the YouTube channel
Commenting on reports of non-combat casualties, the officer suggested that some of the deaths may have been linked to serious illnesses that certain conscripts were already suffering from when they arrived at the training centers.
“For example, over the course of three to four weeks, soldiers whom I had accepted for training came to see me personally. Some of them developed a fever that same day, others the next, but I immediately sent them for treatment. In other words, they were brought to the distribution center already suffering from this illness,” he said.
The officer also stated that the regiment was open to communicating with journalists.
“We called them ourselves and invited them to come… And they said—as I recall—they wrote somewhere that we had invited them, but they didn’t go because they were told people would be buried there. Well, that’s just how it is,” he said.
According to the military officer, the competent law enforcement agencies, including the State Bureau of Investigations, are currently looking into all the circumstances.
“No one is tasked with covering for anyone. No matter what anyone writes right now. The investigation is ongoing. And no one is covering anything up.
It’s a huge organization. And if someone hid something somewhere, or did something wrong, then I think we’re cooperating with everyone today,” he said.
The officer added that final conclusions regarding the causes of each case must be drawn by investigators as part of the official investigation.
As a reminder, the publication “Babel” previously reported on 25 deaths of conscripts during basic military training in the “Skelya” regiment, and later released information about seven more such cases. Journalists handed over all the materials to investigators from the State Bureau of Investigation (DBR). A criminal case has been opened. The regiment states that it is cooperating with the investigation and supports the effort to establish all the circumstances.
Statements from the State Bureau of Investigation
The State Bureau of Investigation (DBR), for its part, reported that “there was no information about possible torture in the ‘Skelya’ regiment, either from the command or from other agencies.”
At the same time, the Bureau’s investigators “are evaluating the actions of each commander.”
Position of the General Staff
Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Oleksandr Syrskyi, commenting on the situation, stated the following:
“There must be transparency, as much as possible, because such cases cannot be swept under the rug—they must be addressed immediately in accordance with the law, through legal channels. On the one hand, we must not create a media frenzy around this regiment, because it is a combat regiment with traditions that emerged and were forged during the war; it fights on the most challenging sections of the front, and the soldiers of this regiment have repeatedly demonstrated courage, resilience, heroism, and bravery while carrying out combat missions. And we must not distort this regiment’s combat history because of the actions of these isolated criminals, who cast a shadow not only on the regiment, as well as on the Army, the Armed Forces, and the assault troops,” Syrskyi said in an interview with TSN.
As reported by "Komersant Ukrainian", pilots from the “Skelya” regiment forced the occupier to surrender using a drone.
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