Add new comment

"Let Ukraine be poor, but this should not happen. Of course we need ceasefire. Let somehow agree on it Novorossiya? I have no idea what it is? I just pray that more people will not die," - the mother of the
man killed by the shrapnel tells to Hromadske wiping the tears. Just a day before her neighbors had buried what had left from the man. He was driving the bicycle and died after the first strikes in the village.

During the fighting which lasted incessantly for two days two people
were killed in the village. Many houses were burned. Shyrokyne is
situated between Mariupol and Novoazovsk, 20 km from Russian border.
In the end of August Russian troops occupied Novoazovsk and opened a
new front in the battle over Donbas. Prior to the truce – which was
broken less than a day after the agreement, the Ukrainian volunteer
battalion was based in Shyrokine. For the last two months this resort
on the sea of Azov hosted up tp 1000 IDPs from war-torn Donetsk,
Horlovka, Shakhtarsk. Most of them left after Novoazovsk was occupied.
However, most of the local residents remained.

The population has different opinions about who is to blame and what
to do. There are those who put the blame on the Ukrainian military,
since they are located in the village. Many are afraid to show their
face on camera. The local residents just do not know who will control
the village a day after tomorrow. - From time to time, Russian media
reported that Shyrokyne is under so-called 'Donetsk People's Republic"
control. Occasionally the Ukrainian National Security Council says it
has no control over the villages. During that time, residents are
waiting for the worst and hope for the best.

Hromadske visits the village as soon as it was accessible and had to
leave as shelling started.