Ukraine war: ‘Soon we will return’ – sinister message from retreating Russians who turned school into military base
As the Russians retreat from communities in the Ukrainian region of Kherson, residents have been left with reminders of their stay.
Vast swathes of destruction afflicted places like Velyka Oleksandrivka, a quiet market town that would spend months on the frontline.
Velyka Oleksandrivka is in the Kherson region
The Russians were pushed out by the Ukrainians in the first week of October, and evidence of fierce fighting is all round.
With a strategic position on the Inhulets River that was prized by both sides, its three-storey community school found itself at the heart of the battle.
Among the lewd graffiti and the letter Z (the symbol of Russia’s war in Ukraine) a map of the UK is defaced
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The local fire chief, Volodymyr, suggested we go and have a look.
“Have you got a torch?,” he said. “You are going to need a torch.”
We found a headlamp and turned on our mobile phone lights, then plunged into the gloom, with the fire chief in the lead.
At the bottom of the steps, we found a chamber that was used as a bomb shelter. There was lewd graffiti and the letter Z, the symbol of Russia’s war in Ukraine, plastered on the walls.
Under the letter, Russian soldiers had proudly written the date they had occupied the town – 26.02.
A children’s school playground, with signs of war
We realised there was far more to this complex than a simple bomb shelter. The basement of this community school had been turned into a military base.
A dozen or more rooms had been fitted with curtains, with the ceiling and walls given a tent-like effect. It seems the soldiers were planning on staying with the subterranean complex given a homely feel.
“Everything was taken from people’s shops and houses. Curtains, carpets, pillows, they were living in here,” said Volodymyr.
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The occupiers had a washing line at the school
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How many soldiers lived down here, do you think?
“I think at least 200,” said the fire chief.
We found multiple kitchens and ad-hoc dining rooms attached, and there are some items in this complex that looked surprisingly luxurious.
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We found bottles of perfumes and silk bedding in one chamber.
“Is that where the officers slept?” I asked.
“Probably,” said Volodymyr.
Sky’s John Sparks saw a message from the Russians, saying ‘soon we will return’
Members of this garrison had made a swift departure, but they left a visual warning on the walls.
“Soon we will return,” said a message spray-painted in large letters, a sinister threat left in the dark.
The battle for Velyka Oleksandrivka had been fought, in part, on the upper three floors, and we discovered the school had been turned into a fortress.
The school was decimated by fighting
The classrooms were sandbagged, with castle-like slits, so the Russians could fire their weapons.
Bookshelves from the school library had been redeployed as blast walls, and Putin-esque world views were repeated on the walls.
A picture of Great Britain and Ireland had been defaced with the letter Z. ‘Russia’ had been painted at the bottom. It seems the Russians were not interested in learning English.
“It’s sad, isn’t it, that the school has been trashed,” I said to Volodymyr.
“Of course, it’s sad, everything is sad. We just want to win as soon as possible and start rebuilding,” he replied.
Yet the cost of rebuilding has reached an extraordinary sum – the Ukrainian government, along with the World Bank and European Union, have estimated recovery costs at approximately $350bn (£300.9bn) – and the conflict goes on.
At least 10 people have been killed after a fire broke out at a retirement home in northern Spain in the early hours of this morning, officials have said.
A further two people were seriously injured in the blaze at the residence in the town of Villafranca de Ebro in Zaragoza, according to the Spanish news website Diario Sur.
Two people remain in a critical condition following the blaze. Pic: AP
They remain in a critical condition, while several others received treatment for smoke inhalation.
Firefighters were alerted to the blaze at the residence – the Jardines de Villafranca – at 5am (4am UK time) on Friday.
Several residents were treated for smoke inhalation. Pic: AP
Those who were killed in the fire died from smoke inhalation, Spanish newspaper Heraldo reported.
The residence is home to 82 elderly residents.
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The blaze started in one of the rooms, Fernando Beltran, the national government’s top official in the region, told reporters.
All of the victims were elderly residents, he added.
Relatives wait for news outside the care home. Pic: AP
Fire crews, paramedics and police officers remain on site, said a spokesperson for the regional government of Aragon who confirmed the fatalities.
It took firefighters several hours to extinguish the blaze, they said.
The cause of the fire is unknown and is being investigated.
UN climate talks are “no longer fit for purpose” and should only be hosted by countries who are trying to give up fossil fuels, veterans of the process have said.
An open letter to the United Nations, signed by former UN chief Ban Ki-moon, made a dramatic intervention in the 29th COP climate summit, under way in Baku, Azerbaijan.
Frustration over petrostate hosts – following last year’s summit in UAE – as well as the influence of fossil fuel lobbyists, prohibitive costs, and slow progress have been mounting in recent years.
The letter acknowledges the strides COPs have made on ramping up climate policies.
“But it is now clear that the COP is no longer fit for purpose,” the authors said.
“Its current structure simply cannot deliver the change at exponential speed and scale, which is essential to ensure a safe climate landing for humanity.”
The letter’s 22 signatories also include former Ireland President Mary Robinson and Christiana Figueres, former head of the UN climate body (UNFCCC) that runs the annual COP summits.
It called for the process to be streamlined and for countries to be held accountable for their promises.
Sky News analysis has found only “marginal” progress has been made since the “historic” pledge from COP28 last year to transition away from fossil fuels.
Pic: AP Photo/Peter Dejong
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The letter also called for “strict eligibility criteria” for host countries to exclude those “who do not support the phase out/transition away from fossil energy”.
This year’s host country, petrostate Azerbaijan, has been engulfed in controversy.
Its authoritarian president Ilham Aliyev used his opening address to criticise western hypocrisy and praise oil and gas as a “gift” from God. His criticism of France, with whom relations have long been tense, drove the French minister to cancel a trip to the summit.
While the government and its COP team run separate operations, host countries are supposed to smooth over disagreements and find consensus between the almost 200 countries gathered.
COP presidencies are also nominating themselves to be climate leaders and throwing their own countries under the spotlight.
Azerbaijan is a small developing country that relies significantly on oil and gas revenues. But it has made slow progress on building out clean power – getting just 1.5% of its energy from clean sources – and led a harsh crackdown on critics in the run up to the COP.
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Azerbaijan team ‘optimistic’ about talks
In an interview with Sky News on Sunday, its lead negotiator Yalchin Rafiyev was unable to say whether Azerbaijan preferred to extract all its oil and gas or seek another, cleaner economic pathway – hard though that would be.
In a news conference yesterday, Mr Rafiyev said the president had been “quite clear” and he would not comment further.
“We have opened our doors to everybody,” he added.
Some diplomats here have hinted that Azerbaijan’s presidency team mean well but might be a little out of their depth. They have never been out in front at previous COPs, but they also only had a year to prepare for their turn hosting the mighty summit.
“My sense of this is that they’re a little underprepared, a little overwhelmed and a little bit short,” said one, speaking anonymously, as is customary for diplomats trying to maintain good relations.
“But I’m not sure that that’s politics. It might just be bandwidth and preparation and things like that.”
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Different regions in the world take turns to host a COP. This year it was up to Eastern Europe, but the selection process took longer than usual due to tensions over Russia’s war in Ukraine and between Azerbaijan and rival Armenia.
Achim Steiner of the UN Development Programme, called it “troubling” that some countries face questions over their host roles.
“Are there countries that are by definition good hosts and others are bad hosts?” he asked.
“In the United Nations, we maintain the principle of every nation, first of all, should have a right to be heard.
“Labels are not always the fairest way of describing a nation. Some of the largest oil producers have hosted this COP in the past, and seemingly this seemed to be a perfectly acceptable phenomenon.”
COP stands for “conference of the parties” and refers to countries (“parties”) who have signed the underlying climate treaty.
Azerbaijan’s COP29 team and the UN’s climate body have been contacted with a request to comment.
World
Body pulled from mine after police cut off supplies to ‘smoke out’ thousands of illegal miners
A body has been recovered from a South African mine after police cut off basic supplies in an effort to force around 4,000 illegal miners to resurface.
The body has emerged from the closed gold mine in the northwest town of Stilfontein a day after South Africa’s government said it would not help the illegal miners.
Around 20 people have surfaced from the mineshaft this week as police wait nearby to arrest all those appearing from underground.
It comes a day after a cabinet minister said the government was trying to “smoke them [the miners] out”.
The move is part of the police’s “Close the Hole” operation, whereby officers cut off supplies of food, water and other basic necessities to get those who have entered illegally to come out.
Local reports suggest the supply routes were cut off at the mine around two months ago, with relatives of the miners seen in the area as the stand-off continues.
Relatives of miners and community members wait at the mine shaft. Pic: AP
A decomposed body was brought up on Thursday, with pathologists on the scene, police spokesperson Athlenda Mathe said.
It comes after South African cabinet minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni told reporters on Wednesday that the government would not send any help to the illegal miners, known in the country as zama zamas, because they are involved in a criminal act.
“We are not sending help to criminals. We are going to smoke them out. They will come out. Criminals are not to be helped; criminals are to be prosecuted. We didn’t send them there,” Ms Ntshavheni said.
An aerial view of a mineshaft. Pic: AP
Senior police and defence officials are expected to visit the area on Friday to “reinforce the government’s commitment to bringing this operation to a safe and lawful conclusion”, according to a media advisory from the police.
In the last few weeks, over 1,000 miners have surfaced at various mines in South Africa’s North West province, where police have cut off supplies.
Many of the miners were reported to be weak, hungry and sickly after going for weeks without basic supplies.
Illegal mining remains common in South Africa’s old gold-mining areas, with miners going into closed shafts to dig for any possible remaining deposits.
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Relatives of miners and community members wait near the mine shaft. Pic: AP
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The illegal miners are often from neighbouring countries, and police say the illegal operations involve larger syndicates that employ the miners.
Their presence in closed mines has also created problems with nearby communities, which complain that the illegal miners commit crimes ranging from robberies to rape.
Illegal mining groups are known to be heavily armed and disputes between rival groups sometimes result in fatal confrontations.
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