ロシア軍と通じている？　住民同士で不信感　ウクライナ東部

【スビアトヒルスクＡＦＰ＝時事】ウクライナ東部ドネツク州スビアトヒルスク。がれきの中で配給の食料を受け取る人の列には、絶対に顔を合わせまいとしている２人の住民がいた。（写真は配給された食料を受け取る地元住民。ウクライナ東部ドネツク州スビアトヒルスクで）
　リュドミラ・オルロワさん（６１）はＡＦＰに対し、エウドキヤ・ヤロワヤさん（７６）に裏切られたと涙を浮かべて語った。「この町が（ロシア軍から）解放される４日前、９月７日でした。彼女はロシア兵に、私が自分の車をウクライナ軍に使わせていたと言ったのです」
　「ロシア兵たちは夕方、銃を持ってやって来ました。酔っていて、３０分ほど尋問されました。家中ひっくり返されました」。ロシア語話者が多いこの町で、オルロワさんはウクライナ語教師をしている。
　一方、ヤロワヤさんはロシア軍との「付き合いはない」とし、食料援助を受け取るために何回か会っただけだと話した。しかし、ロシア軍への協力が援助の条件だったのかという質問には答えなかった。

■疑惑の修道院
　６月、スビアトヒルスクがロシア軍に占領された時、親ロシア派で当時のウォロディミル・バンドゥラ町長は「解放者」が来たと歓迎し、ロシア国旗を掲げて会見を開いた。９月にウクライナ軍が町を奪還すると姿を消し、現在は国家反逆罪で指名手配されている。
　代わってウクライナ軍から町長に指名された民間防衛隊のリーダー、ウォロディミル・リバルキ氏は、厳しい冬が迫る中、ロシア軍の「協力者探し」をしている余裕はなく、それはウクライナ保安局（ＳＢＵ）や警察の仕事だと語った。
　反逆罪に関するウクライナの法律はロシアによる侵攻以降改正され、占領軍に協力し、「死亡または深刻な影響」を招いた場合は禁錮１５年または終身刑を科される恐れがある。
　スビアトヒルスクの緊張の中心になっているのが、ウクライナ軍がロシア軍から奪還したウクライナ正教会の修道院だ。
　修道院長は、２０１４年にロシアを後ろ盾として「ドネツク人民共和国」の樹立を宣言した分離独立派を公然と支持。ウクライナ当局は院内に戦闘員をかくまい、武器を隠していると非難した。
　ウクライナ軍の報道官は、この修道院は「中立の立場を示そうとしているが、ロシアを支持しているのは周知の事実」だと主張している。
　ロシア軍の侵攻に伴って戦闘が激化しても、修道院には約４００人の住民が２００人の修道士と共にとどまっていた。避難命令が出ても移動しなかったため、「（ウクライナへの）忠誠心を疑われることになった」と同報道官は言う。
　だが、炭鉱労働者から転身したテオファヌス神父（５１）は、礼拝でロシア正教会の最高指導者キリル総主教に言及することはあっても、「テロリストや分離主義者、武器を受け入れたことはない」と述べ、「ウクライナの人々のために」毎日祈っていると付け加えた。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/11/14-14:29）

Two neighbours are desperately avoiding each other in a queue for food in the ruins of Svyatogirsk, a spa town whose monastery was recently re-captured by Ukrainian forces.
A tearful Lyudmila Orlova, 61, told AFP she was the victim of a dangerous betrayal of trust by 76-year-old Yevdokiya Yarovaya.
Four days before the town was liberated, on September 7, she told Russian soldiers that I had a car that was used by Ukrainian troops.
They came in the evening with their guns. They were drunk and they questioned me for half an hour. They turned over everything in the house, said Orlova, a Ukrainian-language teacher in this mostly Russian-speaking town.
Yarovaya denied the accusations, saying she had no contact with Russian forces and had only seen them a few times to receive aid.
Food is more important than anything, she insisted. But she did not answer the question if this aid was conditional on collaboration.
There is a lot of anger and resentment. We still haven't come to terms with what we lived through and I would like it not to happen again, said Yarovaya.
She clutched two trays of seasoned pilau rice handed out to her by volunteers helping freezing inhabitants.
- 'Liberators' -
When Russian troops captured the town in June, its mayor, Volodymyr Bandura, celebrated them as liberators, holding a press conference under a Russian flag.
Bandura, a member of the pro-Russia party For Life elected in 2020, disappeared when Ukrainian troops took back the town in September and is now wanted for treason.
In his place the army has named Volodymyr Rybalki, who coordinated the town's civil defence force, as head of the military administration for the re-captured area.
Rybalki said he is trying above all to ensure the welfare of residents as winter approaches and has no time now for any hunt for collaborators.
Working out who collaborated or not is the work of the SBU (Ukrainian intelligence service) and the police. If there have been acts of treason, they will be handled according to the law, he told AFP.
Ukraine's law on treason has been amended since the Russian invasion to include a broader range of offences, including denying that Ukraine suffered an armed aggression.
People who collaborate with an occupying force risk between 15 years in prison and a life sentence in cases where their crime led to death or a grave consequence.
- 'They support Russia' -
In Svyatogirsk, the Holy Dormition Lavra monastery has become a focus for tensions.
Its abbot came out openly in favour of Russia-backed separatists in 2014 and Ukrainian authorities accused him of hiding fighters and weapons inside the monastery.
This time the monastery tried to keep a position that it presented as neutral but we all know they support Russia, said Oleksiy Kashporovskyi, a Ukrainian army press officer.
The 46-year-old pointed to the green domes of the sprawling religious site on a hillside.
At the entrance to the complex stands a statue of the Virgin Mary with only one hand left. The other was torn off by an explosion.
At the height of the fighting, 400 residents of Svyatogirsk sought refuge in the monastery alongside its 200 monks.
Despite orders for evacuation as Russian forces advanced, they stayed.
This led to a lot of questions about their loyalties, Kashporovskyi said.
In the monastery garden, Father Theophanus, 51, a former coal miner, pointed to the fresh graves of three monks killed by a mortar in May.
He said the hostile perception of the monastery is linked to questions about the allegiance of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which formally broke ties with Moscow in May.
We mention Patriarch Kirill of Moscow in our services but we have never hosted terrorists, separatists or weapons, he said, adding that he prayed daily for the Ukrainian people.