On April 17, the new equipment was handed over to the Kharkiv garrison of the State Emergency Service from the Federal Ministry of the Interior and Community of Germany.

The vehicles will help to evacuate civilians from the zone of active hostilities and frontline areas of Kharkiv Oblast faster and more efficiently.

“Thank you very much for the provided equipment, as this equipment will be used by the State Emergency Service to perform tasks not typical for the State Emergency Service: delivery of humanitarian aid, as well as evacuation procedure. We know cases when targeted strikes of the Russian Federation destroyed special equipment of the State Emergency Service. It happened on the Kupiansk axis, in Dvorichna, and other places. Therefore, the needs are constant, and this support is essential for us,” concluded the head of the Kharkiv Regional Military Administration, Oleh Syniehubov.

The Honorary Consul of Germany in Kharkiv, Tetiana Havrish, added that this is not the first cooperation with the State Emergency Service of Kharkiv Oblast. It started with the beginning of a full-scale invasion. German businesses and chambers of commerce already in March 2022 collected funds to help Kharkiv rescuers and purchased sophisticated equipment for extinguishing fires in hard-to-reach places. A huge tank that can be filled with various liquids was purchased.

“Then there was a need for a tractor for this tank. It was satisfied by the association of twin cities Steglitz-Zehlendorf, a Berlin district that bought a tractor. When we bought a tractor and had a tank, we discovered we needed another vehicle to deliver personnel to hard-to-reach locations. The issue of passenger transport has arisen. We also needed transport to evacuate people from the liberated territories,” Tetiana Havrish, the Honorary Consul of Germany in Kharkiv, said about the German-Kharkiv cooperation.

The German community responded to this need on April 11, and within five days, minibuses reached Kharkiv.

About 50 rescue vehicles were destroyed or damaged during the full-scale invasion in Kharkiv city and oblast. Two cars of the delivered vehicles will be in the emergency and rescue squad, one in the main office and two in the Kharkiv district, added Oleksandr Volobuev, head of the Main Office of the State Emergency Service in Kharkiv Oblast.

Earlier: On Easter, April 16, the enemy continued shelling the civilian population of the border and frontline towns and villages of Kharkiv Oblast.