indicate such rumours had been spread by the Romanian intelligence services, which had sent agents across the Soviet border. The Soviet border guards attempted to turn back the group several times, issuing a final verbal warning and firing shots in the air when the people arrived at Varnystia, near the border. After the convoy pressed on, the border guards began to shoot, reportedly after some members of the group fired. According to the Soviet official report, casualty figures amounted to 44 people (17 from Pătrăuții de Jos, 12 from Trestiana, 5 each from Cupca and Suceveni, 3 from Pătrăuții de Sus, 2 from Oprișeni), although the numbers were reportedly higher according to survivor testimonies. A partial listing of those victims which were later identified: From Carapciu: Nicolae Corduban, Cosma Opaiț, Gheorghe Opaiț, Vasile Opaiț, Cosma Tovarnițchi, Gheorghe Tovarnițchi, Vasile Tovarnițchi. From Cupca: Ioan Belmega, Ioan Gaza, Arcadie Plevan, Mihai Țugui. From Dimca (Trestiana): Petre Cimbru, Vasile Cimbru, Nicolae Drevariuc, Petre Jianu. From Suceveni: Dragoș Bostan, Titiana Lupăștean, Gheorghe Sidoreac, Constantin Sucevean. From Iordănești: Gheorghe A. Carp, Mihai Corduban, Dumitru Halac, Ion Halac, Nicolae Halac, Dumitru Opaiț, Constantin Molnar. From Pătrăuții de Jos: Zaharia Boiciu, Ana Feodoran, Gheorghe Feodoran, Nicolae Feodoran, Teodor Feodoran, Maftei Gavriliuc, Ion Pătrăuceanu, Ștefan Pavel, Rahila Pojoga. From Pătrăuții de Sus: Constantin Cuciureanu, Gheorghe Moțoc, Arcadie Ursulean. Other people shot and killed that day: Ion Cobliuc, Petru Costaș, Ion Hudima, Petru Palahniuc. The exact death toll remains a matter of controversy. Moldovan political scientist Aurelian Lavric estimates that, from the initial group of 2,000 people who came to Fântâna Albă that day, some 200 were killed directly by gunfire, and many more wounded, with an additional 24 killed and 43 wounded from a separate group of 100 persons from Carapciu, Iordănești, and Prisăcăreni. Ukrainian historian Serhiy Hakman on the other hand estimates around 50 killed and many wounded. Some of the wounded were allegedly caught afterwards, tied to horses and dragged to previously excavated common graves, where they were killed with shovels or buried alive. Other wounded were brought to the Hlyboka NKVD headquarters, where they were tortured and many died. Some of the latter were taken after being tortured to the city's Jewish cemetery, and thrown alive into a common grave, over which quicklime was poured. An account of the events is given by one of the few surviving eyewitnesses, Gheorghe Mihailiuc (born in 1925, now