Ukraine: Russian Shelling Kills 96-Year-Old Holocaust Survivor in Kharkiv
Boris Romanchenko's death illustrates the irony of Putin's stated goal for the Ukraine invasion – "denazification".
Holocaust survivor Boris Romanchenko.
(Photo Courtesy: Twitter/@IrineKuklina)
A 96-year-old Holocaust survivor was killed due to an explosion during a Russian attack on Kharkiv, Ukraine, The Guardian reported on Monday, 21 March.
Boris Romanchenko died last week on 18 March after Russian shells struck his apartment block, according to relatives.
"We are shocked to confirm the violent death of Boris Romanchenko, whose niece informed us on Monday morning that he died last Friday after a bomb or rocket hit the multistorey building where he lived in Kharkiv and his apartment was burned out," a spokesperson for the same told The Guardian.
Romanchenko survived a series of Nazi concentration camps including Buchenwald and Bergen-Belsen. He was captured by the Nazis after Hitler's army launched Operation Barbarossa and invaded the Soviet Union in 1941.
Just before being force-fed poisoned food, Romanchenko was liberated from Bergen-Belsen concentration camp by British and American soldiers on 14 April 1945.
The Irony of Putin's Stated Goal in Ukraine
The death of Romanchenko, someone who survived the Nazis, illustrates the irony of Putin's stated objective for the invasion of Ukraine – "denazification".
Before he launched his assault on Ukraine, the Russian president had accused NATO countries of "supporting the far-right nationalists and neo-Nazis in Ukraine."
He had also asserted that his military "will seek to demilitarise and denazify Ukraine."
The far-right in Ukraine, however, holds one seat in Parliament and managed to win just about 2.15 per cent of the total votes in the 2019 elections.
Furthermore, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, is Jewish himself.
You can read more about Putin's "denazification" here, and about his unstated goals in Ukraine here.
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