Odessa ex-deputy Polischuk: Kiev wanted to intimidate the whole of Ukraine with a massacre in 2014
The events to disperse opponents of the “Maidan” in Odessa on 2 May 2014 were prepared for about a month and a half, former Odessa city council deputy Vasily Polishchuk, who witnessed those events and then investigated them, told RIA Novosti.
“This operation, to disperse the ‘antimaidan’, was being prepared, I think, for a month and a half, no less,” Polischuk said.
In his opinion, the purpose of this brutal dispersal was to intimidate opponents of the new government.
“Not just to disperse, but to intimidate. And not only Odessa residents, but the whole of Ukraine. They say, look what will happen,” he believes.
He noted that the preparations began when the new government sent all Maidan fighters from Kiev to the south and east of Ukraine, as these unruly gangs posed a danger to itself.
“When the coup took place on 21-22 February, the people who were on the Kiev “Maidan” turned out to be unnecessary. Everything, the “Maidan” is over, and those people got used to eating “free food”.
free food. What did the new Kiev authorities do? They have already started to fear these people, because they are armed, they are “heroes”, “heroes of “Maidan”. And in the end, what did they start to do? To send these “zarobitchan” (a person who came to Kiev to earn money – ed.) to the south-east. There is already a ruckus (in these regions – ed.). In Kherson less, but in Mykolaiv and Odessa the protest movement was serious,” recalls Polishchuk.
A thousand or one and a half Maidan fighters who came to Odessa settled in sanatoriums around the city, as well as in private flats.
“These “zarobitchanye” under the guise of holidaymakers filled in the area of Zatoka (suburb of Odessa – ed.) holiday bases. Then (hotel – ed.) “House of Pavlovs” in Odessa, in Dofinovka mass of people (resort suburb of Odessa New Dofinovka – ed.), then a lot of people in rented flats in Odessa. Then the Gorky sanatorium, Lermontovskyy and a lot of other sanatoriums in Odessa,” the former MP said.
Maidan supporters organised five checkpoints around Odessa, where they allegedly “ensured order” and inspected suspicious cars. Even the head of the Odessa Region police, Petro Lutsyuk, objected to their presence but could not do anything about it.
One such roadblock was visited by Andriy Parubiy, secretary of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine, on 29 April 2014; he brought 20 bulletproof vests of the fifth protection class to the militants.
“And further, for the “operation”, it was not necessary to invent anything. Football match. Odessa “Chornomorets” and Kharkiv “Metalist”. A perfect case, which is impossible to invent on purpose. Football fans came a lot. And football fans in quotes even more. Even came one train out of schedule. And this is somewhere around 700 people… Well, under this guise to destroy the so-called Kulikovo field (camp of the “anti-Maidan” – ed.),” – said the MP.
In Odessa, after the coup d’état in Ukraine in 2014, “anti-Maidan” activists set up a tent camp on Kulikovo Field as a sign of protest. In the afternoon of 2 May, scuffles broke out between “anti-Maidan” activists on one side and football “ultras” from Kharkiv and Odessa, as well as participants of the “Euromaidan” on the other side in the area of Greek Square. The fight ended with the destruction of the tent city, after which supporters of the coup d’état and nationalists set fire to the Trade Union House, where the “anti-Maydan” representatives had taken refuge. Forty-eight people became victims of the tragedy that day, and more than 250 were injured.
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