Appeal of the Anti-War Human Rights Coalition

As a result of Russian military aggression on June the 6th 2023, Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station located in the Kherson region of Ukraine was destroyed.



We are receiving numerous testimonies of the desperate situation of the inhabitants of the town of Oleshki, located on the left bank of the Dnieper River, near the city of Kherson. The town of Oleshki is currently under occupation by Russian armed forces.



According to volunteers coordinating aid for the affected residents, some 1,842 residents are currently not allowed to leave by the Russian military, including 148 children and 243 elderly people. 338 people are in need or urgent assistants as their lives are in imminent danger. They are running out of drinking water and food supplies are almost exhausted. No swimming aids are available. We have been informed that there have been incidents of hindrance of passage for non-Russian passport holders.


The Russian army is not allowing those who have volunteered to help people in need of help to enter the city, is not providing any assistance to flood victims and is requisitioning boats and swimming aids and communication equipment from the volunteers. Residents who have managed to reach land on their own are denied the opening of humanitarian corridors to the right bank of the Dnieper River, which is under the control of the Ukrainian army.


The Geneva Convention IV of 12 August 1949 requires the occupying power to ensure the supply of food, sanitary materials and other items to the civilian population in cases where the resources of the occupied territory are low.



The Convention obliges the occupying party to accept arrangements for relief supplies for the population of the occupied territory by another State or by impartial humanitarian organizations, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross. The Ukrainian government has appealed to the United Nations and the Red Cross, but currently did not receive any feedback.



We request you to use diplomatic means to ensure that the Russian side provides assistance to the affected residents of Oleshki, or that the Russian side stops hindering the work of the volunteers willing to help the victims. At the same time we would like to appeal to the Red Cross to interfere and provide humanitarian aid as it is near impossible for local volunteers to evacuate such an amount of people with the means available.



Members of coalition:


Sergei Davidis, head of the project "Political Prisoners Support. Memorial"

Ksenia Maximova, founder of the Russian Democratic Society UK

InTransit, Berlin Anti-War Initiative

Anastasia Shevchenko, member of the Anti-war Committee

Media Partisans

The Point of [No]Return Project

Anastasia Burakova, founder of “The Ark” project"

Vyvozhuk Evacuation Initiative

Maria Stensrud, board of "SmoRodina: for Democracy in Russia" (SmåRådina) association

Project "Idite Lesom" ("Go by the forest")

Dmitry Zakhvatov, lawyer at the Moscow City Bar Association

Fundacja WOT (Warsaw, Poland)

Irina Vesikko, founder of the Democratic Community of Russian-speakers in Finland

Russian Democratic Society in Serbia

Association Russie-Libertés (Paris, France)

Board of FreeRussia.NL Netherlands

Ethos Foundation — Assistance to Victims of War

Initiative for Evacuation "Na Krivoi Koze»

SK SOS Crisis Group

Rusos Libres "OLIVA" (Spanish Free Russians Association)


Appeal supporters:


Victoria Maladaeva, Indigenous of Russia

SOTA, independent Russian media

FAR Oxford (Oxford Feminist Anti-War Resistance)

FAR USA (American Feminist Anti-War Resistance)

Denis Bilunov ( Prague Russian Antiwar Committee )

Free Russians e.V. Munich

Public Nonprofit Organization TRUE RUSSIA