KNU students allegedly barred from shelter during air raid alert: university denies claim, police investigate. VIDEO+PHOTOS
A dispute has arisen in Kyiv over the shelter in the building housing the Faculty of Economics at Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. Students say they were allegedly denied access during an air raid alert because there was not enough room, but the faculty administration denies the claims.
Censor.NET reports that students described the incident in a Threads post. The videos posted show a crowd in a corridor, and a closed door marked "Shelter."
Students say they were told to go to the metro
The authors of the post claim students were told there were no available spaces in the shelter and were advised to go to another shelter in the metro, about a 10-minute walk away.
"And then they suggested a brilliant solution: walk to another shelter in the metro. It’s about a 10-minute walk. During an air raid alert. When there is already a threat of shelling," the post says.
The authors also said, citing students, that Anzhela Ihnatiuk, dean of the Faculty of Economics, allegedly demanded that they leave the university grounds.
The university denied that students were prevented from entering the shelter
Oksana Kovalenko, deputy dean of the Faculty of Economics, told journalists that the shelter was operating as usual and that the closed door shown in the video led to an emergency exit.
She said the shelter has two entrances, one from the building and one from the street. The main entrance was open, and the crowd in the corridor formed because a large number of students were going down at the same time.
"The second video shows a crowd because the corridor is narrow: when a large number of students go down at once, small bottlenecks form for two to three minutes. A few minutes later, they were gone," Kovalenko explained.
The faculty representative also denied that students were forced to leave the university grounds. She said that during an air raid alert, they are offered two options: go to the shelter in the building or head to the nearby metro.
Police investigate the incident
Kyiv police registered information about the incident in the log of statements and reports. Law enforcement officers are establishing all the circumstances and conducting an inquiry.
