Russia: Captured soldiers aren’t ours
The Kremlin is under renewed pressure to explain how two Russian soldiers ended up apparently fighting in Ukraine after they were captured by forces of the Kiev government.
If the men’s identity is confirmed it would be the first time that serving Russian troops had been taken prisoner inside Ukraine since a shaky ceasefire was agreed in Minsk in February. Ukraine said it would charge the pair with terrorism.
It would also be arguably the most compelling proof of Russian involvement on the ground since ten Russian paratroopers were captured and paraded in front of Ukrainian cameras in August last year. President Vladimir Putin said then that he believed the men had got lost.
In an interrogation video, posted online by a member of the Ukrainian parliament, one of the prisoners identified himself as Aleksandr Anatolievich Akelsandrov, a serving Russian special forces sergeant from the Volga river city of Togliatti. He said that he had been based in Luhansk since March 6 and was operating in a group of 14 men.
‘‘We were discovered. I was wounded in the leg as I tried to get away . . . We’ve been here four-five days,’’ he said.
Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, insisted yesterday that Russia was not involved in the war in east Ukraine. ‘‘We have said repeatedly that there are no Russian troops in Donbass,’’ he said, referring to the region where the separatists have carved out two unrecognised pseudo-states.
Ukrainian officials said that the men were wounded in battle and taken prisoner on Saturday near the frontline town of Shchastya, about ten miles from the separatist stronghold of Luhansk. Viktor Muzhenko, chairman of the Ukrainian general staff, said that they were captured on a reconnaissance mission near a power station that has been fought over for months.
One of the soldiers was wounded in the shoulder, the other in the right leg and they have now been taken to Kiev for further hospital care.
They were captured by the volunteer Aidar Battalion and, according to a doctor who first treated them, feared that medi- cal staff wanted to harvest their organs for sale because of warnings from their commanders.
Yesterday, there were reports that the men were due to be paraded in front of local journalists in Kiev in a move that could violate the Geneva Convention.
The Luhansk Information Centre, a separatist news service, said that the men ident- ified as Russian servicemen were really policemen from Luhansk.
The muted international response to their capture may partly reflect a delicate moment in the diplomacy of the crisis. The Kremlin said that relations between Russia and the US may be improving, citing a visit to Moscow yesterday by Victoria Nuland, the assistant secretary of state.
Following the talks she said that violations of the Minsk agreement were being recorded daily and ‘‘need to stop’’, adding that her discussions had been ‘‘very detailed . . . very pragmatic’’ and centred around ways that the US, which was not part of the Minsk deal, could support its implementation.
More than 6100 people have died since war erupted in east Ukraine in April 2014.
Russia blames the violence on western powers inciting a minority of Ukrainians to extremism. Kiev, Nato and the EU argue that there would be no conflict in the region without Russian soldiers, trainers and money and a flood of Russian weaponry and armour.