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Remains of the destroyed vocational school in Makiivka, where numerous Russian soldiers are said to have been staying at the time the rocket hit
Photo: PAVEL KLIMOV / REUTERS
It was an important success for the Ukrainian armed forces, but a serious blow for Russia: many Russian soldiers were killed in a rocket attack by Ukraine on a vocational school in the city of Makiivka on New Year's Eve.
However, there were contradictory statements about the exact number of deaths immediately after the attack.
For example, it was said from Kyiv that 400 Russian soldiers had been killed with Himar rockets and up to 300 other Russian military personnel had also been injured.
Accordingly, it would have been by far the deadliest single strike since the beginning of the Russian war of aggression.
Unofficial information on the high number of victims also came from the Russian side.
However, Russia officially confirmed only 63 dead after the attack.
The Russian Defense Ministry later admitted the deaths of 89 soldiers.
The dead were apparently mostly fresh recruits from the Samara region in south-eastern Russia who had been transferred to Makiivka in the Donetsk region just the previous week.
A BBC report now raises doubts about both the Russian and Ukrainian statements.
The transmitter determined the names of 92 soldiers who died in the shelling.
Families of more than a dozen other soldiers also have no information about their whereabouts.
According to the broadcaster, the research was based on open sources.
The BBC published a list of the dead Russian soldiers with names and photos.
The broadcaster emphasized that it was still a preliminary list of the soldiers who definitely died in Makiivka.
It may not be complete and needs to be updated.
The deadly shelling in Makiivka attracted international attention and triggered massive criticism of the military leadership within Russia.
According to reports, the Ukrainian army managed to locate the Russian soldiers because they were using their mobile phones.
The decision to station numerous soldiers in a few buildings and possibly in the immediate vicinity of stored ammunition was also criticized as unprofessional.
fek
