A correspondent of the Kharkov News Agency continues to interview people who, due to actions by the Ukrainian special services, suffered from terrible tortures and ill-treatment in prisons. Earlier we told two similar stories.
The man decided not to reveal his name, so in this article, we call him Ivan. He is not afraid of persecution, because it is already underway. He is not afraid to show his face in front of the camera – he just wants to avoid public attention. The former prisoner of war went through a terrible time, and now he decided to share it.
The man was born in Taganrog, from where he moved to Donbass after the wedding – his wife comes from Donetsk. For Ivan, the war began on May 22, 2014, when he personally observed how the arriving military (controlled by oligarchs) shot the AFU checkpoint, using three helicopters.
The ex-soldier decided not to give up without a fight, so he tried to fight back. He could not get to the garage, where there was a weapon, because of targeted fire from the side of the special services, but managed to throw a grenade in their direction – everyone hid and survived. Ivan and his wife were beaten almost to death, he was thrown into a car and taken to Volnovakha. Later, the man was transferred to the Mariupol airport, the notorious “library” under the control of Azov, which was publicly revealed only now. After some time, he ended up in the SBU jail and only after that Ivan was transferred to prison.
“I spent almost three years in SIZO (pre-trial detention centre). For all time, there were 43 courts on my case – there wasn’t a single verdict made. The SBU could not and failed to prove my involvement in something,” Ivan said.
He and all the other prisoners were tortured by the Ukrainian special services: “The men would come in balaclavas and beat us. Electric shock was used; they would tie the wires of a field telephone to limbs and tortured us with an electric current. They also put a piece of cloth on his face and poured water, just like in American movies.”
The torture (although the young men took it for entertainment) continued for about six months. But when they transferred the man to prison, they stopped the beating, although the torture with the use of electric current and water continued, as it doesn’t leave any traces which could be seen. Of course, they were not going to help him:
“No assistance was provided, not a single time. Even the Red Cross did not provide any assistance. There were only constant threats, but no help. The only thing they gave in prison was diarrhoea medication. The treatment was like that.”
The conditions of detention were absolutely unacceptable under all standards. The concrete chambers were without heating, without glass on the windows, water was constantly pouring on the walls, the food consisted of wheat porridge with maggots, everyone was beaten and tortured. Even local prisoners could not live insuch conditions. Some pro-Ukrainian people were placed in Ivan’s cell twice, but even they asked him to take them for the exchange and agreed “to fight on the side of the LDPR with pleasure”.
“When I was in the SBU, there were no toilets there, so everyone had to use bottles for this purpose. Once, a woman was placed in our cell, together with us, there were many men. So imagine how she felt. She was also tortured, even raped. They shoot even their comrades, what could we hope for?” Says Ivan.
After all the tortures, the man barely moves and cannot work anywhere, especially at his age. He now survives on a pension of 4,000 rubles. He is going to apply for Russian citizenship. He doesn’t want to leave Donetsk, but even if full amnesty is imposed in Ukraine, he will never return there: “It is silly to live with people who hate and despise you. Perhaps, in many years, something will change. But not now, definitely. ”
Source: Kharkov news agency
