Oleksandr Matsievskyi, shot by Russians for saying "Glory to Ukraine," told his mother that he would have never surrendered. PHOTOS
For the first time, Regional Directorate of "North" Military Task Force of Armed Forces of Ukraine has released official information about Oleksandr Matsiyevskyi, a soldier of 163rd Battalion of 119th Separate Brigade of Territorial Defense Forces of Chernihiv Oblast, who was shot by Russians for saying "Glory to Ukraine."
As informs Censor.NЕТ, it was reported on official Facebook page of the Regional Directorate of the "North" Territorial Defense Forces.
The statement reads: "On March 6, 2023, further evidence of Russian war crimes was published online. The whole of Ukraine saw the execution of a Ukrainian soldier, a fighter of the 163rd battalion of the 119th separate brigade of the Chernihiv region. The video of the heroic death of Oleksandr Matsievskyi went viral in a day and left no one untouched.
On December 30, 2022, on the outskirts of Soledar, he and four other servicemen were engaged in a counterattack with superior enemy forces while moving. At about 12 o'clock, visual contact and communication with them disappeared. The reinforcements were unable to break through to their position due to continuous mortar fire and heavy small arms fire.
We do not know the details of that battle. We don't know who died and how, we don't know how Oleksandr was captured, unfortunately, there are no witnesses left, all of them are dead or missing. As for the video: Oleksandr's mother, his son Mykhailo and the soldiers of his unit recognized their comrade in these images.
The shooting of a captured Ukrainian soldier has already made the rounds in the Ukrainian media, and diplomats have drawn the attention of our partners. This is a violation of the Geneva Conventions. It is also a meanness and their fear. Because even in this situation, our soldier was not afraid of them and said "Glory to Ukraine". It is very painful to watch these images, but they do not cause fear in Ukrainians. No, the nation becomes even more determined to destroy all enemies and liberate our land.
After a while, an exchange took place and the bodies of our Heroes who died in that battle were handed over to the Ukrainian side. On February 14, 2023, Nizhyn was able to send its countryman to his last journey. A mother lost her son, a son lost his father. But there will be a memory of how a Ukrainian soldier perceives his death for the sake of his homeland with dignity and without the slightest fear.
Sashko was born on May 10, 1980, in Moldova, where his mother, Paraskovia Mykhailivna, was deployed. She worked as a technologist at a Chisinau shoe factory. It was there that Oleksandr later graduated from high school and an electrical engineering college. Then the family returned to Nizhyn, to their homeland. Until February 2022, Oleksandr worked in his specialty. From the first day of the full-scale aggression, he went to the Nizhyn TCC and JV, but was unable to join the army right away. He helped to make fortifications, kept watch at the checkpoint, prepared bottles of incendiary mixture and persistently went back to the recruiting station. On March 11, he was enlisted in the Nizhyn Territorial Defense Battalion. Oleksandr studied military affairs diligently and was appointed a sniper. In December, when the battalion was about to deploy to the east, Oleksandr did not tell his mother that he was going to the active combat zone, as he did not want her to worry. When he said goodbye to his mother, he thanked her for giving birth to him.
On December 29, he called his mother, and it was their last conversation. After Sashko said, "Mom, I will never surrender!" Paraskoviya Mykhailivna realized that her son was at the front. Then there were difficult days, Sashko did not call, his phone did not answer. It was only in the evening of January 7 that a message came - "the subscriber is back online". After the words of his comrades that Sashko was gone, life was divided into before and after... And then again, the ordeal of identifying his own child in the Kyiv morgue, examining all those bullet holes that ended the life of the warrior.
The mother recalls, "When the video of the death appeared online, my heart broke again. It was my Sashko, and then a call from his son, who shouted with tears, "I saw my father killed!"
The mother knows her son well, and his act, which has spread all over the world, clearly characterizes him. She is confident that his comrades will avenge him. Glory to Ukraine!"
As reported, on March 6, a video was posted online showing the Russian occupiers shooting a captured Ukrainian soldier for saying "Glory to Ukraine." The footage received a wide public response. The minimal amount of information about the time and place of this crime led to the identification of the Ukrainian Hero with 2 people.
The Facebook page of the 30th Separate Mechanized Brigade stated that the footage showed a soldier of this unit, Tymofiy Shadura, but emphasized that this was "preliminary data".
The editor-in-chief of Censor.NET, Yurii Butusov wrote in his blog, that it was a soldier of the fire support company of the 163rd battalion of the Territorial Defense of Nizhyn of the 119th brigade of the TRO forces, Oleksandr Ihorovych Matsievskyi.
On March 8, the Regional Directorate of the TRO Forces "North" of the Armed Forces of Ukraine officialy stated, that the footage showed soldier Oleksandr Matsievskyi.
