The Horrors of Russian Captivity
Throughout human history, captivity has been a great danger for the military. A prisoner of war is a person who is not free, and at any moment he or she can become a victim of arbitrariness, not live to see peace, become disabled, and lose mental health due to abuse and torture, and extreme psychological pressure. The world has long since realized these dangers and established safeguards against them. In particular, mechanisms have been created to protect the rights and lives of prisoners of war. International humanitarian law is based on the Geneva Conventions. The Third Geneva Convention of 1949 clearly defines the treatment of prisoners of war, the First and Second Conventions deal with the fate of the wounded, and the Fourth Convention is aimed at protecting civilians in war. It would seem that Russia, as a country that has ratified all these Conventions, has a developed legal school, deep military traditions and a globally recognized culture, should be an example of humane treatment of prisoners of war, and should protect the "rights and customs of war." But in the case of Russia, the opposite is true.
Despite the fact that Russia claims to be a co-founding member of the UN and one of the global guarantors of security and humanism, and has taken the place of the USSR not only among the members of the Organization but also as a permanent member of the UN Security Council, it not only maliciously ignores international humanitarian law but openly commits systemic crimes against Ukrainian prisoners of war and civilians. It sees nothing wrong with using helpless people as weapons.
Human Shield
In December, the world saw footage from a Ukrainian reconnaissance drone near the village of Robotyne. The footage shows Russian soldiers storming Ukrainian positions using three Ukrainian prisoners of war as human shields, hiding behind them and shooting from behind the prisoners of war. Then, during the retreat, the Russians also fire at the prisoners and probably kill one of them. The Geneva Convention directly prohibits the use of prisoners of war in hostilities, let alone to hide behind them, in particular, Article 23, which provides that "no prisoner of war shall at any time be sent to or detained in an area in which he would be exposed to fire from the zone of hostilities, nor shall his presence be used to protect any point or area from military operations."
In addition, this is a violation of the customs of war. What can we say about the moral component of such actions by the Russian military? The case is under the control of Ukrainian human rights activists and the Ombudsman, and will be investigated.
Terror Against the Helpless as a Russian System
Russia's plans for the invasion of Ukraine clearly assumed that there would be no organized resistance from the Ukrainian Defense Forces, so Kyiv would quickly be defeated. Again, it is clear that when the war began, the Kremlin immediately planned large-scale police and filtration operations on the occupied territory of Ukraine. For this purpose, quite large forces of the Rosgvardia (including OMON and SOBR), Center "E" of the Russian Interior Ministry, the FSB and other punitive structures were involved.
The plan was to carry out large-scale punitive actions with mass indiscriminate abductions, torture, and extra-legal detentions. Both military and civilians. Arbitrariness and cruelty towards prisoners and abductees during the planning of the conquest of Ukraine was one of the methods of warfare and establishing control over Ukrainians.
Intimidation, random terror, and threats to life and health must overcome the very thought of resistance. The Russians use a similar scheme in the territories they have managed to occupy. And it would be strange if the Russians did not use it in relation to prisoners of war. This is, so to speak, a historical tradition of Russia. Even in the days of the Russian Empire, in particular during the First World War, the situation of prisoners of war from Germany and its allies in Russia was extremely difficult, and there is a great deal of evidence of this. What can we say about communist times? For example, out of a hundred thousand Germans who were taken prisoner by the Soviets near Stalingrad, only six thousand returned home.
To illustrate Russia's perception of international humanitarian law, in 2019, in preparation for a major war, Russia actually withdrew from the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in International Armed Conflicts. Moscow withdrew its signature to the Additional Protocol to the Convention. By doing so, Moscow has stated that it does not recognize the role of the UN Special Commission as a judicial body that has the right to judge a country for violations of civilian rights in war.
It should be noted, however, that this does not mean that Russia has become "invulnerable" to its crimes. International humanitarian law is not just about the Geneva Conventions. The Russian dictator Vladimir Putin boasts that he is a lawyer, but he is clearly a bad lawyer. This move is reminiscent of an inscription made by Russian soldiers that was found by Ukrainian Defense Forces soldiers on the wall of a building in one of the liberated settlements where the occupiers lived: "There are two answers to the question of what we are doing in Ukraine. The first is that it is all a lie. The second is that Ukrainians deserve it all. Both answers are true." Russians are aware of their crimes, but they sincerely believe they have the right to commit them.
Russian Captivity: the Threat of Death
The world now has ample evidence that Russia's treatment of Ukrainian prisoners of war does not meet the requirements of international humanitarian law and is criminal. The mere sight of Ukrainian prisoners of war returning home during exchanges indicates harsh conditions of detention and systematic starvation. It is also obvious that no medical care is provided in captivity. And the vast majority of those returning from captivity testify to systematic physical and psychological torture. All of this is a violation of the Geneva Convention. As well as the fact that the Russians make it impossible for relevant humanitarian organizations, including the International Red Cross, to access Ukrainian prisoners of war and do not allow them to communicate with the world and their relatives, and do not inform the Ukrainian side about the prisoners.
At the same time, the Russians are organizing a series of fake trials of Ukrainian prisoners of war for alleged "war crimes." One of these is the trial of Ukrainian human rights activist Maksym Butkevych, who, being a pacifist and anarchist by conviction, volunteered to defend Ukraine on February 24 last year. He was taken prisoner in June last year. He was tortured there, and Russian propaganda declared him a Nazi, although this sounds absurd to anyone who knows about his real human rights activities.
On trumped-up charges, Butkevych was sentenced to 13 years in a maximum security colony. His case is widely publicized, he is supported worldwide by human rights organizations and various states, as he is well known for his human rights work, but he remains imprisoned. There are several such trials. In particular, the trial of the defenders of Mariupol, the Azov regiment, as this unit has been used in Russian propaganda for almost a decade as a symbol of mythical "Ukrainian Nazism."
It was against the captured Azov fighters that the Russians committed a horrific terrorist act of mass murder. The prisoners of war who were captured after the completion of the defense of the Azovstal plant in a completely surrounded area were held by the Russians in a colony in Olenivka, Donetsk region, where they were tortured. Some of the Azov residents, about 200 people, were relocated to a fenced-off area. On the night of July 28-29, 2022, explosions and a fire broke out there, killing 53 people and injuring about 130. Russian propaganda and officials accused Ukraine of firing with Hybrids missiles, which allegedly killed Ukrainians. However, available testimony from Azov survivors, some of whom were later released as part of an exchange and are now safe in Ukraine, suggests that the explosions were carried out by Russians. The Mission to Investigate the crime, established in August 2022 by the UN Secretary-General, did not begin its work because the Russians did not allow it to access the crime scene. As a result, it was disbanded in January 2023.
Crisis of Humanitarian Practice by the Red Cross
In general, it should be noted that the Russian-Ukrainian war has revealed a serious crisis in the practice of protecting the rights of prisoners of war and implementing the principles of International Humanitarian Law. In particular, the International Committee of the Red Cross, which is mandated to deal with the issue of prisoners of war, is not fulfilling its tasks. Ukraine allows the ICRC access to Russian prisoners of war, and they are verified. It is obvious that the detention of these prisoners of war, their food, and medical care are in accordance with the standards provided for by the Conventions.
Instead, Russia does not allow the ICRC access to Ukrainian prisoners of war. Even the agreed procedure for the release of Azovstal's defenders did not result in the full verification of all Ukrainian military personnel. Of course, this is the fault of Russia, which seeks to conceal its crimes and rarely allows the International Red Cross to visit prisoners of war. However, the ICRC is obliged to take a tougher stance in the event of such violations, to publicize them and actively cover them.
Russia Has Frozen Exchanges
At the beginning of the war, the Russians did not expect Ukraine's resistance to be fierce and organized, and they were unprepared for the loss of prisoners. There are several camps where Russian prisoners are held. The ICRC, international media, and several Ukrainian journalistic projects have access to them, and they work on a systematic basis and prepare interviews with prisoners of war with the clear consent of the prisoners of war. Several hundred of these interviews are available on YouTube.
However, we can confidently say that Russia is not too interested in its ordinary citizens who, through the fault of the state, became participants in the aggression and were taken prisoner. In November 2023, the Ministry for the Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories of Ukraine reported that there were 4337 Ukrainians in Russian captivity, including 3574 military and 763 civilians (captivity for civilians practiced by the Russians is also a violation of the Geneva Convention, and this figure is conditional, especially since the Russian Federation includes, for example, former military personnel as prisoners of war).
Nevertheless, Russia is extremely reluctant to make prisoner exchanges. The last major exchange took place in August 2023, with 22 prisoners of war on each side. In an interview with the Associated Press, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that there could be non-public exchanges directly on the battlefield. But in general, Russia is freezing the process. Ukraine's initiatives and actions to return its defenders from captivity are met with Russian reluctance to return even its own citizens. Moreover, Russia ignores written statements about the desire to exchange Russian prisoners of war themselves. At the same time, the Russian Federation seeks to use prisoners of war as a lever of pressure on their relatives, forming the opinion that Ukraine is allegedly refusing to exchange them. The Russians want to use this blackmail to push relatives of Ukrainian military to organize massive actions of disobedience and protests against the government.
***
In the context of the aggressive war waged by Russia against Ukraine, it can be stated that the inhumane treatment of Ukrainian prisoners of war by the Russian Federation is observed at all levels, from the frontline, where it is evidence of the general inhumane attitude of the Russian population, to government policy. Its goal is to completely break a person in order to break the ability to resist and use prisoners of war to put pressure on their relatives and Ukraine, to use them as hostages. This is the behavior of a terrorist state. And Russia must be punished for this.