DONETSK, December 18. /TASS/. Social media messages claiming children can get New Year’s gifts at a Donetsk school could be a ruse by the Ukrainian army to commit an act of violence against citizens, Natalya Shutkina, head of the Donetsk People’s Republic’s (DPR) mission to the Joint Center for Control and Coordination of Issues Related to Ukrainian War Crimes (JCCC), told TASS.

Earlier, Donetsk Mayor Alexey Kulemzin pointed to fake social media reports about a New Year’s gift giveaway for kids at a school in downtown Donetsk. "Reports about the alleged distribution of gifts at a school <...> are untrue. They bring to mind last year’s events, when the Ukrainian armed forces fired a Tochka-U missile at downtown Donetsk on March 14, 2022. Before the tragedy, Ukraine’s Center of Psychological Operations had been actively urging people to gather in the area that was hit by the missile at the designated time on the designated date. It’s possible that today’s message was sent for the same purpose," Shutkina noted.

She stressed that a decree issued by the regional head banned public gatherings.