In the occupied Mariupol, Russian occupation authorities opened a drama theatre after restoring it. In March 2022, the Russian army dropped an air bomb on a building where civilians, including kids, were hiding and destroyed the theatre, killing around 600 people.
The reopening of the building in December 2025 was not cultural renewal; it was a carefully staged act of propaganda targeting the West layered over concrete, rubble, and a silenced crime.
This article investigates how the Mariupol Drama Theatre became both a war crime scene and a tool for Russian propaganda to conceal that crime.
Kremlin propaganda networks launched a massive propaganda campaign around the “reopening of the Mariupol theatre”, involving not only sanctioned Russian state media but also the Pravda disinformation network and proxy pro-Kremlin online news outlets in the EU countries.
In the posts, Russian fake news networks accuse “Ukrainian neo-Nazis” of the destruction of the Mariupol theatre, which was reduced to rubble with people inside by a Russian bomb, as proven by many independent investigations. In this cynical PR campaign, Russia is leveraging its agents of influence abroad to whitewash its alleged war crime.
On December 28, 2025, Russian occupation authorities officially reopened the theatre after what they called “restoration.” The reopening featured a performance of The Scarlet Flower, a Russian fairy tale, and a concert attended by pro-Kremlin figures including Denis Pushilin, Alexander Beglov, and actor Vladimir Mashkov, all associated with Russia’s war propaganda.
“Russian and Soviet classics have returned to the stage,” the theatre said in a PR statement. The Russian occupation authorities presented the renovation as a sign of revival, while the theater’s former actors and Ukraine condemned the reopening as “dancing on bones.”
A concert was held at the site of the Russian crime, attended by the leader of the pro-Russian group “DPR”, Denis Pushilin, who was charged in absentia with treason in Ukraine; the mayor of St Petersburg, Alexander Beglov, who has been under US sanctions since April 2022; and Russian actor Vladimir Mashkov, who was sentenced in absentia to 10 years in prison for encroaching on the territorial integrity of Ukraine.
The Mariupol City Council, operating in exile, described the event as “dancing on bones.”. Ukrainian officials emphasised that holding concerts at a mass grave was an act of profound cynicism, not a cultural revival.
“The invaders officially opened the so-called ‘restored drama theatre’ in Mariupol. At the site of one of the greatest tragedies, the invaders staged a concert with singing and dancing,” the Mariupol City Council wrote on the official page.
According to the city council, the so-called restoration involved filling the basement with concrete, effectively destroying potential evidence. The facade, once clad in white Crimean stone, was replaced with painted brick. Sculptural elements were crudely recreated. What stands today is an imitation, not a restoration, it said.
The Mariupol Drama Theatre was bombed by Russian forces on 16 March 2022 during the siege of Mariupol. Over 300 people died under the rubble of the drama theatre after Russian air strikes.
At the time, the theatre served as the city’s largest civilian shelter. Hundreds of people were hiding inside: families with children, elderly residents, people sleeping in corridors, and others queuing for food outside near the field kitchen.
In front of the building, the word “CHILDREN” (ДЕТИ) was written in large white letters, visible from the air and recorded by satellite imagery. For those inside, it was a sign of hope. They believed it would protect them from Russian bombers.
It did not.
According to investigations by Ukrainian authorities and journalists, Russian aviation dropped a high-explosive air bomb directly on the theatre. Due to occupation and evidence destruction, estimates vary, but journalistic reconstructions suggest that approximately 600 people lost their lives.
The Donetsk Regional Prosecutor’s Office reports that the bombing resulted in the deaths of 600 people and the injuries of 400 others. However, the city’s occupation currently makes it impossible to establish the exact number of deaths.
The Russians were excavating the bombed drama theatre in Mariupol. This is evidenced by satellite images from the American company Maxar Technologies, as reported by CNN. Later, the invading authorities finished dismantling the rubble and opened the territory. Now it is impossible to establish the exact number of dead.
The Russian side almost immediately pushed alternative false narratives, claiming an internal explosion or Ukrainian responsibility. These versions collapsed under eyewitness accounts, testimonies, visual evidence, satellite data, and forensic analysis.
The tragedy of the Mariupol Drama Theatre drew international scrutiny.
Amnesty International concluded that Russian forces carried out a deliberate airstrike on a civilian building used as a shelter, noting there was no evidence of military use and that the “CHILDREN” sign was clearly visible from the air.
The organization’s report notes that no evidence of military use of the theatre was found, and the inscription “CHILDREN” was clearly visible and could not have been ignored by chance. Amnesty International considered the airstrike a deliberate attack on civilians that claimed hundreds of lives. The attack was classified as a likely war crime.
Read the full report here: https://www.amnesty.org/en/storage/2022/06/EUR5057132022ENGLISH.pdf
Human Rights Watch confirmed that hundreds of civilians were inside and stated that even a hypothetical military presence nearby could not justify such an attack under international humanitarian law. The attack was called a gross violation of international humanitarian law.
A separate investigation by Forensic Architecture reconstructed the strike using spatial analysis, satellite imagery, and videos. Their findings showed the damage pattern was consistent with an air-dropped bomb, not an internal blast. The researchers showed that the nature of the destruction corresponds to an airstrike, not an “internal explosion”.
The Associated Press published an extensive investigation based on survivor testimonies, floor plans, and expert review. Witnesses reported that rooms were packed—roughly one person per three square meters—and that people gathered outside a field kitchen were all killed. The exact number is still impossible to say since Mariupol is under occupation, and some of the evidence has been destroyed or hidden.
According to journalistic investigations, around 600 people were killed in the theatre. This estimate was determined using a 3D model of the building and numerous eyewitness accounts describing exactly where people were at the time of the attack.
The AP investigation recreated what happened inside the theatre on the day of the bombing using the accounts of 23 survivors, rescuers, and people intimately familiar with its new life as a bomb shelter.
The AP also drew on two sets of floor plans from the theatre, photos and videos taken inside before, during, and after that day, and feedback from experts. All the witnesses said at least 100 people were at a field kitchen just outside, and none survived. They also reported that the building’s rooms and hallways were densely populated, with approximately one person occupying every 3 square meters of available space.
Many survivors estimated around 1,000 people were inside at the time of the airstrike, but the most anyone saw escape, including rescuers, was around 200. The survivors primarily left through the main exit or one side entrance; the other side and the back were crushed.
The AP investigation refutes Russian false claims that Ukrainian forces demolished the theatre or used it as a Ukrainian military base. None of the witnesses saw Ukrainian soldiers operating inside the building. And not one person doubted that the theatre was destroyed in a Russian air attack aimed with precision at a civilian target everyone knew was the city’s largest bomb shelter, with children inside.
After Russian invading forces took control of Mariupol, the occupying authorities actively sought to erase evidence related to the strike on the theatre. The Kremlin’s pro-war bloggers were invited from Russia to record videos that argued that Ukraine had destroyed the building in a “false flag attack.”
The Russians began the “restoration” of the theatre in July 2023, filling the basement with concrete. “The new building only imitates the destroyed theatre. The sculptures that were destroyed due to the negligence of the workers are of poor quality. The destroyed drama theatre had no plaster — its facade was decorated with white Crimean stone, which was delivered by sea. The occupation authorities simply painted the brick walls,” the Mariupol City Council said.
The city council noted that the so-called restoration of the theatre is an attempt to hide the traces of a war crime and part of the city’s Russification policy. Russia’s plan is to stage works by Russian writers and playwrights in the theatre’s repertoire.
The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry reacted to the “celebrations” of the so-called reopening of the Mariupol Drama Theatre.
“In March 2022, Russia dropped an aerial bomb on the Mariupol Drama Theatre, where hundreds of people were sheltering – children among them. It deliberately turned this place into a mass grave, committing a blatant war crime. December 2025 – three years later – Russia is hosting festive events to mark the so-called “reopening” of the theatre, at the very site where Mariupol’s civilians were killed, accompanied by dances, concerts, and celebrations. This is deliberate terror and it is a deliberate attempt to evade responsibility. Russia must be held accountable for taking the lives of innocent people and for committing genocide against the Ukrainian people.”
The rebuilding of the Mariupol theatre fits into a broader strategy identified by Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation. The aim is to create an illusion of normal life and development under Russian control, particularly for Western audiences, it concluded.
“Having rebuilt the Mariupol theatre and individual buildings, Russian propaganda is trying to create a showcase for the “Russian world” from these locations. In reality, most of the cities of Donbass captured by the Russians remain in ruins and are almost depopulated, and the residents who remained in them do not have access to basic services and live under constant terror from the invaders.”
While selected buildings are showcased, large parts of Mariupol remain in ruins. Residents continue to report lack of housing compensation, limited access to basic services, and constant pressure from occupation authorities. Culture, in this context, becomes a stage set.
Former theatre actors have openly condemned the reopening in an interview with the Guardian. Photographer Evgeny Sosnovsky called it pure cynicism, arguing the site should be a memorial. Actress Vira Lebedynska said performing there felt morally impossible, stating that joy cannot exist atop buried victims. Many former Mariupol actors now perform Mariupol Drama, a play documenting the siege, which has toured across Europe.
Mariupol photographer Evgeny Sosnovsky, who moved to Kyiv after the occupation of the city, called the reopening an act of cynicism. He said in an interview with the media:
“I can’t find any other word for it than cynicism. There should be a memorial in that place to commemorate the residents of Mariupol who died during the Russian occupation of the city, not a place for entertainment.”
Former actress Vira Lebedynska said she cannot imagine songs being sung or performances staged at the site. Lebedinska is now in the western Ukrainian city of Uzhhorod with a small group of former Mariupol actors.
“Fun, songs and dancing on top of all those bones? I have a feeling that the souls of the people who died there won’t let them perform well there,” said Vira Lebedynska.
Lebedynska is taking part, along with other Mariupol actors, in the play Mariupol Drama, which is based on the events at the theatre during the Russian siege of the city and is touring across Europe.
“At first it was really hard to perform, and I wondered why I had to remember all that, but I continued and realised that my mission was to tell the world what happened there in the theatre,” said Lebedynska.
Meanwhile, some actors remained in Russian-occupied Mariupol and are collaborating with the new theatre. “The most important thing for them is to act on stage, and everything else is irrelevant. “We are out of politics” is their principle. It doesn’t matter to them where they are — in Russia or in Ukraine,” Sosnovsky said.
The former director of the theatre remained in the city but was demoted and now leads the orchestra. Russian authorities appointed Igor Solonin, a former deputy director of the Donetsk circus, as the new head of the theatre.
The Mariupol Drama Theatre withstood Nazi occupation in the twentieth century and World War II. That historical memory makes its destruction in 2022 especially painful for residents. A place associated with safety and civic life became a target, not by accident, but by design.
The Mariupol Drama Theatre in its classic form opened in 1960. It was built over several years as the main stage of the city, a space where culture was not supposed to be a background but a part of the city’s identity. The architecture of the building was typical of post-war Soviet monumentalism: a massive facade, symmetry, and a sculptural composition that was supposed to create a sense of solemnity and stability.
The theatre was specifically placed in the city centre so that it would form a square around itself, routes, and the habit of “meeting near the theatre”, as the Mariupol news website described.
For several generations of Mariupol residents, this place was very concrete and very human. Here they took their children to their first performances, came here on tour, and celebrated city dates and rallies against injustice. The theatre was not a “parade decoration”; it lived with the city. That is why in March 2022, people instinctively gravitated here as a place associated with security and civilian life.
During World War II, Mariupol was under Nazi occupation; the city suffered massive destruction and losses. However, the theatre survived. After the war, it was restored, and it once again became part of a peaceful space. This is the fact that Mariupol residents often recall today: the theatre survived the war of the 20th century—and that is why it is especially painful to realise that it did not survive the Russian offensive in the 21st.
Reopening the theatre without accountability for the war crimes does not restore culture as Russian propaganda tries to show; it attempts to overwrite memory. The concrete poured into the basement may hide bones, but it cannot bury evidence forever.
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