In Mariupol dark-skinned players were driven out from the football stadium

On April 23, about ten men in generic military uniforms without insignia drove out a group of players, among which there were 8 dark-skinned students, from the football stadium in Mariupol.

As reported in the report for April of the group for monitoring rights of national minorities.

It is reported that the stadium is located next to the base of the Azov battalion. Men, armed with batons, ordered the dark-skinned young people to leave the stadium, threatening them.

The students were driven away and were not allowed to even take their clothes and shoes from the locker room.

“Dark-skinned students ran to the locker room, but aggressive people followed them and began filming on their phones. Foreigners ran out of the territory of the football field”, – as the publication 0629 has quoted Serhiy, who witnessed the event.

According to him, people in military uniforms tried pursue them outside the stadium. Students were forced to walk around the city in a football uniform.

“Employees of the Levoberezhnyi District Police Department persuaded the students not to write a statement on the pretext that no one was hurt. However, after a resonance in the media it became known that the police are conducting an investigation on this incident”, – said in a statement.

The press service of the Azov battalion denies the involvement of its soldiers in the incident.

Dmytro Yaroshenko, representative of the press service of the National Police of Donetsk region, made a promise to the Human Rights Information Centre that the police will comment on the incident after the completion of the investigation.

“Investigation will be conducted in a month. We can not say anything about results until the investigation is completed”, – he said.