Russian military training grounds have torture pits for rule breakers
The Russians have set up so-called torture pits at the Prudboi training ground in Volgograd Oblast and the Totsky training ground in Orenburg Oblast, where they put "offenders".
Source: Vazhnye Istorii (Important Stories), a Russian independent news outlet
Quote: "In the summer of 2023, Dmitry Medvedev, Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council, who is overseeing a large-scale campaign to recruit 400,000 contract soldiers into the Russian army, visited two Russian training grounds where volunteers were being trained before being sent to war – Prudboi in Volgograd Oblast and Totsky in Orenburg Oblast.
The same summer, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu visited Prudboi, which is considered the best training ground in the country.
Soldiers who had been trained there during Medvedev and Shoigu's visits told Vazhnye Istorii and the Conflict Intelligence Team about the existence of torture pits on the territory of the training grounds.
We were able to confirm their words with the help of satellite images. Here's what awaits volunteers at Russian training grounds before they are sent to war."
Details: One of the Russians who had been to the training ground told journalists that Prudboi did indeed have pits where offenders were held.
He said that several of his comrades-in-arms had been in the pits, mostly caught drinking.
According to him, the military police beat them and then put them in the pit, where they were kept for several days to a week. Food was brought once a day and no medical care was provided.
He added that one of his fellow soldiers died at the training ground after being in the pit, although Vazhnye Istorii and CIT have not been able to find independent confirmation of this incident.
Later, the man managed to leave the training ground and flee the country: "I saw what a s**t show was going on around me: classes were held for the show, phones were confiscated, and those who were outraged were put in pits along with alcoholics and drug users, and I decided to run away."
The man also told the CIT that he had seen with his own eyes two pits next to the training ground.
His words are confirmed by a satellite image of the site taken in early August 2023.
It shows two deep pits in the ground not far from the tent camp, at the same point as the man's description. In another image from April 2023, there are no pits. They appeared later.
Another Russian soldier who deserted was trained at the Totsky training ground in Orenburg Oblast in the summer of 2023. He said that at the Totsky, volunteer soldiers who "violated the charter" were beaten, handcuffed, and those most "violent" were also threatened with pits.
The man did not see the pits with his own eyes, but he personally heard his fellow soldiers being threatened with being "put in a pit".
The media studied satellite imagery of the Totsky training ground: in an image from early August, two pits were found not far from the field camp where the soldiers lived.
In the summer of 2023, a new, 25th army was being created at Totske, which was promised to be sent to war in September. Only volunteer soldiers were brought there: 80% of them were former convicts, the people who had served their time, under articles ranging from murder to rape of minors.
According to the man, a group of close associates of the unit commander, Colonel I. Yem, dealt with the troublemakers at the Totsky.
The media sent inquiries to the press services of the Central and Southern Military Districts of the Russian Federation, as well as to the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, asking about the pits on the territory of the Prudboi and Totsky training grounds.
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