In the morning of 29 July, Russian propaganda media claimed a penal colony in Olenivka, near Russian-occupied Donetsk, where Ukrainian POWs were kept, was shelled. It accused Ukraine of the strike, particularly – of making it with the HIMARS MLRS.
RIA Novosti reported that 53 were killed and 75 injured.
Sources of Ukrainska Pravda in Ukrainian intelligence said that Russians carried out the strike and that POWs who had defended the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol and surrendered in the Azovstal steelworks were for some reason transferred to the barracks that were hit a few days beforehand.
Ukraine’s General Staff said that the strike was made to cover up the torture and murders of Ukrainian prisoners of war, as well as to accuse Ukraine of committing war crimes.