Volunteers ask Russian authorities to let them into Oleshky to evacuate civilians

Oleshky is under Russian occupation. The town went underwater on the first day after the dam break.

The locals are forced to wait for rescuers on the roofs of their houses. There were reports that only people with Russian passports were provided help. The Russian Emergency Ministry is not allowing Ukrainian volunteers into the town as well.

The Ukrainian mayor of Oleshky Yevhen Ryshchuk has stated that Russian servicemen started evacuating people from their rooftops on 7 June in the evening.

One of the volunteers that helps people in Oleshky has told Novaya-Europe that the Emergency Ministry does not have enough boats and rescue teams to complete the evacuation.

Yaroslav Vasilyev, a coordinator for the volunteers, has revealed that the Russian military seizes boats from the volunteers who manage to get into the town.

At first, people left requests for help, and volunteers outside the town tried to coordinate them. Owners of boats and other necessary things, as well as residents of Oleshky who were ready to take other people out, responded to these announcements.

“If there was access for volunteers, it would be much easier. Now local residents have become volunteers,” one of the volunteers explained.

Victims

Ryshchuk says that a total of nine people have already lost their lives in Oleshky. Volunteers say the death toll may be way higher.

“The volunteers say that many streets are now completely under the water, so if there were any people alive there yesterday, today everyone there is [likely] dead,” the volunteers told Novaya-Europe.

This morning, Ukrainian volunteers tried to reach families in Oleshky twice by boat, but they were not allowed in again, Yaroslav Vasilyev told Novaya-Europe. Many of those requests were from the part of Oleshky that is located in a depression.

“The situation is critical, we have a large number of applications for evacuation, and dramatically, we have very few boats. There are already hundreds of victims. All sorts of people, elders and children, swim through the streets. There are a lot of dead bodies,” Vasiliev said.

He says that every 30-40 minutes people report that their relatives are already dead.

At the same time, another volunteer says there is no exact information about the dead.

“In a location close to the river bank, the situation was really close to critical as the water level there was very high, people were screaming for help, it was necessary to save people from there first of all, everything was complicated since the rowing boats the locals had were unfit for some locations, and volunteers began to bring motor boats yesterday.

Today it was one of the first places where rescue volunteers headed to, but they were not allowed in: everything was cordoned off by the Ministry of Emergency Situations or the military. Rumour has it there is no one left to save, but so far these are just rumours, no one has seen the dead bodies,” a volunteer told Novaya-Europe.