“We were forbidden to speak Russian”: how Mariupol police officers work after the liberation of the city

• How Mariupol police officers work after the liberation of the city

In the liberated Mariupol, police officers resumed their work.

The Primorsky District Department of Internal Affairs, among other departments, returned to work.

The employees do not even have their own building yet - the old one was badly damaged during the shelling, there are not even computers left.

Law enforcement officers are based in the foyer of the hotel located next door, and right on the porch - this is how they accept applications from residents of the city. 

Tatyana Klyus, who has worked in the Mariupol police department for 20 years, shows the department's dilapidated building: broken windows, gaping holes in the walls. 

• The territory of the Primorsky District Department of Internal Affairs in Mariupol

• RT

“Since March, the Azov battalion has been based in the building, so there were assaults on this building, shells hit.

Now it is unlikely to be restored, ”the RT interlocutor sighs.

The headquarters of the SBU was located next to the police station, but all employees were evacuated from there with the start of the special operation, and until recently the building was empty.

Now the hospital of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the DPR is located here.

• Tatyana Klyus near the building of the Primorsky District Department of Internal Affairs in Mariupol

• RT

Tatyana recalls how the Ukrainian authorities, even before the liberation of Mariupol, advised her and other employees to leave the city, intimidated her, but the woman and her husband did not want to leave their hometown.

“We were told that we, as law enforcement officers, were brought into a certain base, we will all allegedly be subject to arrest as having not supported the Donetsk People's Republic.

Or maybe they will cut the throat - and such were the rumors, ”says Klyus.

Doubts were dispelled when specialists from the DPR Ministry of Internal Affairs, who arrived in the city, invited former Ukrainian police officers to a meeting.

According to Tatyana, they were received very well, they were offered to be reinstated at work.

The woman agreed.

“All the terrible myths with which we have been frightened for many years – about the prison, about the cut throat – all this was immediately dispelled.

We are not threatened with any criminal cases, we have not been subjected to any torture.

They came here voluntarily.

I want to continue working here, to help the people of Mariupol fight crime,” explains Tatyana.

"Forbidden the Russian language"

Tatyana Klyus told RT that over the past eight years the situation in the city has been tense - people, including employees of municipal institutions, for example, were forced to speak only Ukrainian.

All the documentation was kept on it, and this created a lot of difficulties for the Russian-speaking Mariupol residents, Klyus complains.

“We were forbidden to speak Russian, although we are a Russian-speaking region,” Tatyana is indignant.

“Moms taught us Russian.

But we had to communicate with citizens in Ukrainian, and hold meetings, give interviews - exclusively in Ukrainian.

It was hard."

RT and the former operational duty officer of the same Primorsky department, Alexei Turbin, complained about widespread Ukrainization.

Due to the situation in Ukraine and, in particular, the ban on the Russian language, he left the police force in 2017 after almost 20 years of service.

Now that the city has been liberated, Alexei wanted to return to his old position.

• Alexey Turbin

• RT

According to him, many members of the Ukrainian police did the same.

Now about half of the employees in his department are seconded from Donetsk and Makeevka, the rest are former colleagues of Alexei.

“I didn’t work in the police for eight years, and it will sound funny, but I decided to return on February 23 of this year.

Many pensioners are now returning, on May 15 there was a formation - it was half an hour of hugs, because you meet people whom you have not seen for several years, with whom you used to work.

We were happy to see that everyone was alive and well.

You understand, we are all policemen at heart, this is one and the same school.

We, if you dig around, are all acquaintances and friends.

Because the world of policemen is very small, everyone knows each other.

We have been separated for eight years.

And now everything is being restored, ”Turbin rejoices.

Marauders and the search for the missing

Alexey Turbin tells RT that now people whose apartments were robbed by looters are turning to them for help - many houses in the city were damaged during shelling, windows and doors were knocked out, so there was free access to the premises.

“If possible, we collect documents for numbered items, we are looking for them.

We are also looking for stolen cars, - the interlocutor of RT lists.

- Relatives, friends and acquaintances of people who have gone missing are also contacting.

So far, the Ministry of Emergency Situations is dealing with this particular task, but we provide legal assistance to citizens.”

The RT correspondent went with the police on one of these trips.

Along the way we pass a lot of damaged houses.

The walls of the building where the call came from were riddled with bullet holes.

Traces of the arrival of shells are also visible - in some places large holes gape in the partitions.

• At the exit of the employees of the Primorsky District Department of Internal Affairs

• RT

The woman who called the police recently returned to her apartment and found that there were no windows or doors, and things were missing.

“When they returned, (in the apartment

) there was nothing: no frames, no doors.

And there is no son, ”explains a resident of the police house.

After the outbreak of hostilities, many residents left the entrance - ads with phone numbers were pasted everywhere on the doors - so people who left their homes tried to inform relatives and friends that they were alive.

• The inscription on the door in the apartment building in Mariupol

• RT

The operational duty officer of the Primorsky District, Sergei Golovatyuk, who also returned to service after the liberation of the city, told RT that now Mariupol residents mainly seek advice - television and radio broadcasting are not working, so people simply have nowhere to get legal information.

“During the day, we are now approached by 50-60 people.

We explain to people

how to get help.

For example, in order to receive humanitarian aid, you need to know when and where it is given out.

People still do not know what certificates are needed to receive a pension, various other payments.

When I saw the work of colleagues from the DPR, it seemed to me that they would not be harmed by the help of people who know the local mentality, know how people live here.

We supported people then and we support them now.

This is our city, we protect it, ”concluded Golovatyuk.