Nova Poshta published pictures and videos of the terminal in Kharkiv destroyed by Russians on October 21. Russian propagandists claimed that trucks had secretly transported infantry fighting vehicles. You can see in the pictures that the terminal was working as usual—processing regular packages, including humanitarian aid, and there was no military equipment “hidden” in the trucks.

  • At night on October 21, 2023, Russians attacked the Kharkiv Nova Poshta Terminal. As a result, six employees were killed, 16 more wounded, and the terminal building destroyed. The company representative said they had no chance to save themselves because the air alarm signals were to be heard a few seconds before the explosion.
  • Russian propaganda resources almost immediately started spreading their old narrative that Nova Poshta supposedly transported military-related goods. So their attack was not on a civil object with multiple dead and wounded and not a war crime but on a “legit military target.”
  • Those stories of Russian propaganda that Nova Poshta transported British Bradleys and German Leopards are pretty old and absurd; they can be compared with “Ukrainian biological laboratories.” For example, Russian Telegram channels shared a story in May 2023 of Russian hackers who were supposed to hack Nova Poshta’s servers and interfere with the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ logistics.
  • Thus, after the attack and killing of civilians on October 21, Russian propaganda media again used the old good narrative. The transportation company commented on their terminal’s workflow:

“We transport regular packages and parcels. We help many charitable and volunteer organizations. We process many humanitarian deliveries, especially for our army men: clothes, food, and medicine. But we never transported any weapon. There is no bottom of primitive propaganda the RF cannot achieve by trying to justify another war crime against civilians and crucial social infrastructure.”

  • The company also published photographs and videos of the truck contents and packages being processed in the Kharkiv terminal.
All pictures made and shared by Nova Poshta
  • It worked with deliveries for the city and region of Kharkiv, for those people who suffer Russian shelling every day. It was packages from their families and friends, online shop deliveries, and humanitarian aid from charity funds.
  • You can see regular things in the pictures.
  • It was not the first Russian attack on the Kharkiv Nova Poshta terminal. The first one happened in 2022.
  • The company launched the Kharkiv Innovative Terminal (KhIT) in 2020. It is the second-largest in Ukraine after the Kyiv Innovative Terminal (KIT). The construction lasted 18 months. Its total square is over 19,000 m2. Hundreds of employees work there. Its capacity is up to 20,000 parcels per hour. Such hubs cost about EUR 10-15 million in investment.