Ukrainian draft officials use violence to force conscripts to go to the front line, a captured soldier has told the Russian military.
In a video released by the Russian Defense Ministry on Monday, a man identified as Nikolay Timchenko claimed that draft officials treat conscripts as expendable “cannon fodder” and ignore their health conditions.
According to Timchenko, he was detained at home by police and recruitment officers after failing to report to a draft office upon receiving a call-up notice. He said he was “thrown into a cellar,” where his protests about having health issues were ignored.
Timchenko claimed that around 50 other men were being held with him, including some with disabilities, all of whom were forced into service.
“The draft officers were hitting us on the ribs and the head,” he said, adding that their ID papers were confiscated and that he did not receive a salary. He said he told the officers he “didn’t want to fight in a war,” but was drafted anyway.
The alleged mistreatment continued at the training center, where, according to Timchenko, recruits were beaten with the butts of assault rifles for failing to follow orders.
He added that when he was deployed to the partially encircled Donbass city of Krasnoarmeysk (known as Pokrovsk in Ukraine), he saw “many people lying on the road, both dead and wounded.”
“When we saw it, we realized that we were just cannon fodder sent to die,” Timchenko said, adding that he decided to surrender after spending days without food and resorting to drinking rainwater.
Ukraine’s mobilization campaign has been marred by widespread draft evasion, protests, and allegations of corruption. Videos of officers ambushing men on the streets and shoving them into vans have gone viral, causing outrage on social media. The Ukrainian parliamentary human rights commissioner, Dmitry Lubinets, reported last week that the complaints about “illegal” mobilization have doubled since early June.