WAR IS RAPE
'Monsters': Ukrainian women recount agony in Russian prisons
Wed, October 26, 2022
When Ukrainian medic Tetyana Vasylchenko was released from Russian captivity and, on the bus back to freedom, handed a Ukrainian flag, she finally broke down.
"I had never cried, even when I lost comrades," Vasylchenko told journalists. "But when I was given a Ukrainian flag on the bus, I burst out crying."
Vasylchenko and 107 other women were freed from Russian detention last week as part of a long-negotiated prisoner exchange with Moscow.
Four of the women spoke to journalists in Kyiv on Wednesday to recount what they have lived through: packed prison cells, hunger, physical abuse and humiliation.
"The conditions in detention were horrendous," said Viktoria Obidina, a military nurse, who was captured at the Azovstal steel plant that became the symbol of Ukrainian resistance.
Inmates were "packed like sardines" in jail, food was repulsive and they were rarely allowed to go outside for walks, she said.
Speaking to AFP earlier this week, Obidina said she had been held in the notorious prison in the Russian-occupied town of Olenivka.
Her captors told her that her daughter, who left the steel plant with Ukrainian civilians, had been sent to an orphanage.
- 'These people are monsters' -
Women prisoners were subjected to "intense psychological pressure" and constantly humiliated, said Vasylchenko.
"Their favourite thing was to say 'Ukraine doesn't want you. No one is swapping you because everyone forgot about you. Who needs you, women?'" Vasylchenko recalled.
The detainees were held "in an information vacuum, they were telling us how everything in our country was going badly."
Authorities in Kyiv estimate that a few thousand Ukrainians are still being held by Russia as prisoners of war.
Guseynova, a volunteer from the eastern Donetsk region, spent three years in captivity. She was detained in 2019 by pro-Russian separatists, accused of making pro-Kyiv statements to orphaned children she was taking care of.
Guseynova was too traumatized to speak about what she had lived through.
"Too little time has passed since I was liberated, it's difficult," she said.
The trauma was also painfully fresh for Inga Chikinda, an army marine.
"I am not ready to speak about physical abuse just yet," Chikinda, who lost eight kilos and started stuttering after being detained, said.
"These people are monsters."
'Inciter of genocide' : Kyiv urges ban of Russia's RT after anchor calls for drowning of Ukrainian children
Kyiv has called for ban of Russian state-controlled RT media outlet after anchor called for drowning of Ukrainian children.
By India Today Web Desk: Terming the Russian state-controlled RT media outlet as an inciter of genocide, Ukraine on Sunday called for its ban after one of its commentators called for Ukrainian children to be drowned for viewing Russians as occupiers under the Soviet Union. RT has faced intense scrutiny over its coverage of the ongoing crisis sparked by Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
RT presenter Anton Krasovsky in a show broadcast last week said children who criticised Russia should have been 'thrown' straight into a river with a strong current'. He was interacting with Russian science fiction writer, Sergei Lukyanenko.
"They should have been drowned in the Tysyna (river)," Krasovsky interjected. "Just down those children, drown them."
Calling for a global ban on Russia's RT, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said, "Governments which have still not banned RT must watch this excerpt."
"This is what you wide with if you allow RT to operate in your countries. Aggressive genocide incitement (we will put this person on trial for it), which has nothing to do with freedom of speech. Ban RT worldwide!"
Krasovsky is a pro-war commentator on Russian TV who has been sanctioned by the European Union. Another segment of the interview showed that Krasovsky also laughed at reports that Russian soldiers had raped elderly Ukrainian women during the invasion.
RT America permanently shut down operations in March after Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered troops to invade Ukraine.
Russian state television, heavily controlled by the Kremlin, has been a vocal cheerleader of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Presenters have routinely dismissed reports of Russian war crimes and many have used airtime to call on Putin to adopt an even more aggressive approach to the invasion.
(With inputs from Reuters)
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