Ukrainian troops stockpile heavy weapons in schools across DPR

Kyiv: As the Russian invasion of Ukrainian soil continues, the troops have been amassing heavy weapons and setting up firing bases in schools across the Donetsk People’s Republic, including in Slovyansk, Pokrovsk, Kostyantynivka, and Privolye, Sputnik reported, quoting a senior Russian official said on Saturday.

“In DPR’s Slovyansk, personnel of the Ukrainian armed forces have been quartered in Boarding School No 1 and at the Research Institute of High Voltage Engineering. They set up arms depots and rocket launchers on the grounds,” Col. Gen. Mikhail Mizintsev told reporters.

With US-donated heavy weapons stationed nearby, the firing nest were also reported at schools No 17 and No 9, the military official added.

A school in the DPR’s Pokrovsk is housing snipers, heavy machine guns, and military hardware, including multiple rocket launchers.

The Ukrainian troops have entrenched at two schools in the village of Privolye, Sputnik stated, citing local media.

Ukrainian forces controlling the city of Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine turned three schools into firing bases, and arms and ordnance depots, while the city of Dnipro saw a school and a church transformed into military strongholds, Sputnik reported.

On February 24, Russia began a military operation in Ukraine, responding to calls for help from the breakaway republics of Donetsk and Luhansk in countering the aggression of Ukrainian troops.

Nearly 14 million Ukrainians have been forced to flee their homes due to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, according to United Nations (UN) estimates and most of those displaced are women and children.
The conflict has left 15.7 million Ukrainians in need of humanitarian support, with some of them lacking access to water and electricity.

Three million children inside Ukraine and over 2.2 million children in refugee-hosting countries are now in need of humanitarian assistance. Almost two out of every three children have been displaced by incessant rocket attacks and fighting between the two nations.