National Guard to use boats, Humvees in expanded DC presence

On November 2, 2026, a clash occurred outside a temporary base for the National Guard's Azov Corps in Petropavlivska Borshchahivka, a village near Kyiv. Rumors had spread on social media that armed individuals were holding around 40 people against their will in the basement and torturing them, including soldiers who had left their units without permission and men who had been mobilized.

The crowd, estimated to have grown to about 100 people, attempted to break down the gate and storm the building to free the detained individuals. A woman named Valentyna Moloda, dressed in a paramedic's uniform, was the most active member of the mob, claiming that four people inside needed assistance and that one person had died (though her account could not be confirmed).

Moloda was seen on video kneeling outside the house, pleading to be let in to rescue the detained soldiers. The Interior Ministry denied the claims of illegal detainment, stating that the house was a temporary base for a unit of the Azov Corps, consisting of mobilized soldiers and those who had left their units without permission.

National Guard Commander Oleksandr Pyvnenko and Kyrylo Budanov, the head of the Ukrainian president's office, arrived at the scene later that day. They worked to defuse the situation, but clashes continued until midnight. The crowd blocked a bus meant to transport the soldiers from the house to the hospital. Moloda was detained on November 3, and a Kyiv court subsequently ordered her and another individual, Tetiana Kireieva, to be held in pretrial detention.

The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) alleged that Kireieva had hired Moloda to free a National Guard soldier from the temporary base, with Moloda posing as a medical worker and Yena, a friend of Moloda's, posing as a paramedic.