Ukrainian teenager taken to Russia from orphanage near Kherson commits suicide - Russian media. PHOTOS
18-year-old Oleksandr Yakushchenko, who was taken from Ukraine to Russia by Russian invaders during the occupation of Kherson region, has committed a suicide. In Russia, he lived in a foster family in the Krasnodar Krai.
According to Censor.NET, this was reported by the publication "Important Stories".
The publication has a death certificate for Oleksandr Yakushchenko. He died on 10 January 2024 in the village of Akhtanizovskaya, Krasnodar Krai.
The head of the foster family, Aleksandr Lukashenko, said that Yakushchenko's body was found by workers a few kilometres away.
"How do I know why? He was 18 years old, an adult child. He was just living with us," he commented on the reasons for this act.
Shortly before his death, Yakushchenko sent a voice message to his friends in which he spoke about his relationship with his foster family.
"Nobody needs me there. I was made to understand this. I'm ruining everyone's life. I can't do it, I'll hang myself... If I hadn't been there, no one would have had any f#cking problems now, if only I hadn't come here. I can't... Fuck! It hurts so much. I don't know what to do," Oleksandr said.
Yakushchenko and 7 other children lived in a family-type orphanage in the village of Tokarivka near Kherson. When Russian troops occupied the Kherson region, the head of the orphanage, Lidiia Sharvarly, began to cooperate with the occupiers, and soon she was appointed the "head" of the village. Later, Ukraine de-occupied Kherson, after which Sharvarly left for Russia, taking her children with her.
In Russia, the children were placed in a temporary accommodation centre in the village of Kuchugury, Krasnodar Krai. There, Sharvarly relinquished custody. Yakushchenko was taken into care by the foster family of Natalia and Alexander Lukashenko. The latter says that formally, the teenager lived under their care for only a month before he came of age, and then the family simply fed him - "he had nowhere to go, you can't kick a guy out".
Several times, Oleksandr talked to his friends about returning to Ukraine to his mother, Olena Yakushchenko. Her children were taken away from her back in 2016. Olena blames it on herself: after her mother's death, she drank a lot, as did her husband. Since then, she says, she has not seen her son, but continued to communicate by phone.
"He often called me every other day, every other day. He was crying about the war, of course, and was freaking out because they were taken away. He called me before the New Year and said I would come soon. And in January I was already informed about it (the death of my son - Ed.). I can't tell you how it feels to lose a child. I want them to find out how my son died," the woman says.
According to journalists, there were conflicts in the foster family. There was at least one case when Lukashenka's family took away his documents.
"The guardianship said he wanted to return to Ukraine, his passport was taken away from him, and he went and hanged himself because of that," said Karina Petrenko, who was brought up in a Ukrainian orphanage with him.
