Russian soldiers who refuse to fight are starved and kept in pit – Ukraine's Deputy Defence Minister

The Russian occupiers in the temporarily occupied part of Zaporizhzhia Oblast are keeping their own soldiers in a pit without food because they refused to fight.

Source: Hanna Maliar, Deputy Minister of Defence of Ukraine, on Telegram

Quote: "At the end of August of this year, near the settlement of Pokrovske, Zaporizhzhia Oblast, the Russian police are keeping more than 50 Russian soldiers in a so-called zindan (a deep dug pit) for their refusal to participate in combat actions. They are fed with meagre rations only once a day."

Details: Maliar noted that the Russians are using similar deep pits as "prisons" throughout the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine for punishing locals detained for violating curfew or for any other far-fetched reason.

She added that the mobilised soldiers are arriving in the occupied city of Donetsk en masse; most of them are labour migrants from former Soviet republics who went to Russia to earn money and obtained Russian passports.

These people state that they were basically taken to the territory of Ukraine by force, under escort. At the moment, they are being held under guard in the houses, whose owners have been deported to Russia.

Maliar added that the rations received by the conscripts are almost over, and no other food supply is provided until their arrival at combat units.

Moreover, the Russian occupying administrations of the Svatove district in Luhansk Oblast were informed that in September 2023, the food supply for the personnel of the units deployed in the territory of this district will be stopped.

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