Lesya Nikitiuk tells about the torture of Kherson residents
During the filming of her travel project about Ukraine during the full-scale war, LeMarrutka, Lesya Nikitiuk and her team visited the hero city of Kherson. The presenter also visited the liberated villages and talked to people who had survived the difficult times. The consequences of Russia’s aggression in the Kherson region and the heartbreaking stories of indomitable Ukrainians that the whole world should know about will be shown by New Channel today, April 11, at 20:00.
“For almost nine months of occupation, the people of Kherson, surprising the whole world, fearlessly resisted. Some of them became partisans,” says Lesia Ivanivna. “In the issue, you will see Andrii, who is called a ‘creative partisan’. When we were driving around the city, we saw inscriptions everywhere. For example: “The Armed Forces will come and restore order” or “Glory to Ukraine!” Most of them are the work of a brave guy.”

LeMarrutka
Andriy fearlessly wrote patriotic slogans when the city was literally “overrun” by the enemy.
“In mid-March, I started going out about 30 minutes or an hour before the curfew ended,” he says. “On the one hand, painting in the morning is more dangerous because there are no people on the street yet, and you immediately attract attention. But somehow it was possible to run around the yards. And in the daytime, when the lighting is better, you can blend in with the crowd, take pictures and send them to whomever you need. One of my tasks was not only to show that Ukrainian will never end in Kherson, and no one here has surrendered or bent to the new regime, but also to give people who stayed in the city the opportunity to go out in the morning, see the new sign and smile.”

LeMarrutka
Unfortunately, on August 4, Andriy was detained by the occupiers. It happened in one of the city’s public institutions.
“I understand that I was caught by accident. At the time, they didn’t know who they had detained. Probably, someone just said that there was a person with a pro-Ukrainian position in the bar,” the guy says. “I spent 47 days in the torture chamber. I was subjected to a lot of torture. One meal a day, a ban on sleeping for several days, beatings, electric shocks to the genitals and teeth. They are real masters of this…”

LeMarrutka

LeMarrutka Lesya Nikitiuk
After one of the numerous interrogations that the occupiers arranged for Andriy, the guy was released.
“The man who was interrogating me knew that I was just spray painting something. So I managed to “fall for the fool” and say that I was only writing “Glory to Ukraine!”,” the activist recalls. “He believed me, laughed and said that if I was a good boy and did not return to this activity, I would be released. Of course, I promised. But a week later I went back to writing on the walls.”
Watch the episode of the travel project “LeMarrutka” from Kherson today, April 11, at 20:00 on New Channel!
Author: Daria Skotchenko
Photo: press service