Journalists from the British publication The Times visited a Ukrainian camp for Russian prisoners of war.
They say soldiers captured on the battlefield are being “re-educated” and “reprogrammed” in preparation for transport to a Ukrainian camp or exchange. Every day in captivity follows the usual scenario.
In the camp, prisoners wake up to the Ukrainian anthem – a loudspeaker is installed in each cell. After breakfast, prisoners observe a minute of silence in memory of those killed as a result of the Russian invasion. To get from their cells to the canteen, Russian servicemen walk past portraits of Stepan Bandera and Taras Shevchenko. A representative of the Ukrainian coordination headquarters for the treatment of prisoners of war, Petr Yatsenko, says that one of the prisoners mistook a photo of Bandera for a photo of the young Putin.
The publication notes that in this way Ukraine is trying to rid prisoners of the neo-imperialist ideology imposed on them by the Russian authorities. And it also introduces Russians to the history of Ukraine, says Yatsenko:
“This is a crash course in Ukrainian history that we give to prisoners to debunk Putin’s claims that Ukraine is not an independent nation.”
Prisoners of war work six days a week, in particular, assembling furniture, and honestly receive $8 a month for their labor, which they spend on drinks and sweets in the camp store. Coca-Cola is in greatest demand, claim journalists from The Times. Approximately 1/3 of all prisoners of war are former prisoners recruited by the Russian army into the penal military unit “Storm-Z”.
The camp where the journalists visited is the largest in Ukraine, but now it is overcrowded, since the Russian Ministry of Defense has actually frozen the exchange of prisoners, the publication notes. The last one occurred on August 7: then the head of the office of the President of Ukraine Andriy Ermak announced the return of 22 military personnel.
Pyotr Yatsenko confirmed that the exchange of prisoners has not taken place for several months, but preparations for the resumption of this process continue. He stated that the Russian side was delaying the exchange:
“We would gladly exchange them even tomorrow for our defenders. We know that the conditions in which our defenders are in Russia are significantly worse than those that we offer as a European country that complies with the Third Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War.”
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the countries have exchanged more than 2,000 prisoners on both sides, according to Russian authorities and media reports. The last known exchange took place in early July. According to information provided by Denis Pushilin in October, about 500 Russian military personnel are currently being held captive in Ukraine. This figure cannot be verified because Ukraine does not report the number of captured Russian soldiers.
Russian Ombudsman Tatyana Moskalkova, who oversees prisoner-of-war exchanges, said in early October that her staff communicates almost daily with the head of the Ukrainian parliamentary committee on human rights, Dmitry Lubinets: “I have an employee who communicates directly with them, calls them, discusses cases and specific lists,” she said, adding that other large-scale prisoner exchanges are planned.
July 28, 2023. Russian POW camp in Ukraine. Vladimir Zolkin talks with Russian prisoners:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXYY0f0aesE
And this is a report by Kazakh journalists who were among the first to enter the territory of the Ukrainian prison where Russian prisoners of war are being held. This report shows the conditions in which Russian prisoners of war are kept, their way of life and everyday life.
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