The horrors I’ve seen of Ukrainian, NATO-backed, shelling of completely civilian areas of the Donbass throughout 2022 (and 2019, 2023…)

Eva Karene Bartlett. Sep 23, 2025

September three years ago in Donetsk, in the space of 5 days, Ukrainian deliberate shelling of the very centre of the city killed 26 civilians, most of whose bodies or parts of bodies I saw in the streets or in a burnt out bus. These were 100% non military, purely civilian, areas.

*Warning: Some of the footage is not blurred and shows quite clearly Ukraine’s terrorism of Donetsk, in very central areas of the city, where there are no military targets, only Donetsk civilians. see here – https://odysee.com/@EvaKareneBartlett:9/sept-22-shelling:0 ]

On Monday, Ukraine slaughtered 16 civilians, including two children, with 155mm NATO shells, according to the head of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), Denis Pushilin. The projectiles hit two adjacent neighborhoods, decimating residential and commercial areas – including a market that had previously suffered fatal attacks.

…the carnage on Monday was worse than anything I’ve seen in my months of reporting here. Chunks of flesh littered the street – part of a hand, a foot, an ear. Someone had put a dead man’s phone on his stomach. It was ringing, the cheery ringtone incongruous with his lifeless body and the scenes and stench of death around him.

For most people, the concept of war is a distant one, and deaths are normalized by media reporting the numbers of victims and destroyed buildings – so most who hear of civilians being killed don’t really understand what a scene like this looks or smells like.

For the locals, it is also normalized, in its own way, after over eight years of Ukrainian attacks – a tragically grotesque kind of normality, where the post-bombing routine starts soon after the last explosions die down.

…another Ukrainian assault, which took place on Saturday. The center of Donetsk was hit by around ten bombs over the course of 30 minutes around noon. At least four civilians were killed, one of whom I saw still on the ground. Some minutes later, her body was taken away. One of the shells hit a car driving along Artema Street, setting it ablaze and killing two civilians. By the time I reached that site, the vehicle had burned out, the dead taken away. Workers were already repaving the roads, sweeping debris and glass from sidewalks.

On Thursday, again around noon, Ukraine again shelled central Donetsk, this time next to a busy market. The shelling left six people dead on the street and in a burned out bus. This makes at least 26 civilians killed by Ukrainian shelling, with Western weapons, in the space of just one week.

From my overview of these terror bombings: Western media continues to ignore how Ukraine is using NATO weapons to kill innocent civilians in the Donbass

2022 was a very hard year for the Donbass; this 5 day period I mention in September was just a glimpse into the horrors Donbass civilians endured not only throughout 2022 but since Ukraine began bombing them in 2014, long before Russia commenced its Special Military Operation.

Below is most of what I witnessed throughout 2022 (and also some from 2019, 2023) during & following Ukrainian shelling.

In 2022, in April I went to a market in western Donetsk which had been shelled by Ukraine. Two bodies of the five civilians killed in the market were still lying on the ground. I believe this is because–just like Israel does–Ukraine double strikes the same area, meaning rescuers or anyone who comes to help the wounded or clear the bodies could be shelled and killed.

This was a large and very busy market place in a working class district. I’ve been to such markets, in central Donetsk (also bombed by Ukraine) and near the two Russian areas I’ve lived. They are frequented (and many of the stall run by) by grandmothers, by mothers, by civilians, not military. The only thing “strategic” about shelling them is Ukraine’s blood lust to kill Donbass (Russian) civilians. People I encountered that day told me this wasn’t the first time Ukraine shelled the market or the district, they said the shelling was routine.

[ https://odysee.com/@EvaKareneBartlett:9/ukraine-bombed-a-busy-donetsk-market:2 ]

My article on this Ukrainian bombing: Ukrainian strike on Donetsk market was a terrorist act

On May 5, I went to Kirovsk, a city in the Lugansk People’s Republic to the west of Lugansk, Ukrainian forces only a little further west. Kirovsk and surrounding areas have—like throughout both autonomous Donbass republics—since 2014 been shelled by Ukrainian forces.

Just outside the city of Kirovsk, on an otherwise quiet lane, I saw a home hit by Ukrainian shelling on April 26………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. *At the below link you can find many more of my articles & videos, including from Mariupol when the fighting was still ongoing in Azovstal, and later in Mariupol showing the return of life to the city (2022, 2023, 2024).

https://ingaza.wordpress.com/the-donbass-my-articles-videos-interviews-from-on-the-donetsk-lugansk-peoples-republics-2019-present/

https://evakarenebartlett.substack.com/p/a-review-of-what-i-saw-of-the-horrors?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=3046064&post_id=174146101&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email