On Monday, September 8, nearly 40 dead fighters of the volunteer battalion, Aidar, and paratroopers of the Ukrainian army, were finally recovered after an agreement was reached with the separatists.
On September 5, an hour before the ceasefire went into effect, the terrorists executed an ambush. The new agency www.theinsider.ua reported that they opened fire on a battle group consisting of members of Aidar together with paratroopers from the 80th Independent Airborne Brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
It was only possible to retrieve the bodies now, and the task of the individual identification of the casualties is ongoing. Unfortunately, complete identification may prove impossible: the soldiers were attacked with everything from small arms fire to artillery, and many of them were incinerated beyond recognition. Further, they have since begun to decompose, while others were torn to pieces by the explosions.
According to army eyewitnesses, the ambush began with a deception, the enemy flying the Ukrainian flag as they encountered the column. The exact number of casualties from the ambush is unknown. According to the information obtained by the Ukrainian army, among the deceased are fighters who had recently been freed from captivity.
As a result of the confusion, it is possible that some of the presumed dead might still be alive and remain as prisoners of war. At the same time, soldiers from other, unknown units, are among the casualties.
Army spokesmen explained that a body exchange took place, a dead terrorist of the LNR for the bodies of these Ukrainian soldiers. This information has not yet been independently verified.
The army contends that this delay in the release of the bodies was deliberate and criminal, so that the deceased would decompose beyond recognition. As well, they sought to hide the evidence of the murder of soldiers wounded during the ambush and other indignities to human remains.
Source: UNIAN, Translated by Jeffrey Stephaniuk
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