A Ukrainian vlogger, who has embarked on a project to interview Russian prisoners of war, has revealed that 90 percent of them are from Russian hinterlands, including occupied Donbas. Let's try to classify them somehow. It is occupied by the inhabitants of Donbas. This is the lowest caste and link in the whole ogre structure because they are basically cannon fodder everywhere, sometimes even unarmed, Zolkin told The New Voices Of Ukraine, a Kyiv-based news outlet.
Zolkin said none of them knew how to use weapons, were recruited from the streets, taken out of homes and thrown into combat. I think it goes like this: the puppet DPR leader Denis Pushylin is told by the Kremlin: We need a thousand pieces of cannon fodder. He goes down and recruits them by any means possible. Everyone is taken to a hangar where they are given something resembling a military uniform. The vlogger said Ukrainian soldiers were better equipped and trained.
He claimed that the prisoners revealed that even the physically disabled were recruited. The magazines were given only on arrival at the battle scene, though they were given rifles.
Zolkin said that most of the conscripts were clueless, and some of them were 18 -- 19 -- 20. The majority of them came from Russian hinterlands, but he could also interview those from cities like Rostov and Ekaterinburg. They call their mothers and they both tell them that the captain who led them into battle and threw them on the battlefield has returned to Russia and has written a report that they are deserters - those whom we held captive. They are shocked and afraid to return home because they are going to be beaten up there, Zolkin told the news outlet.
The Russian soldiers he met were obsessed with the Maidan a wave of large-scale protests known as Euromaidan that began in response to President Yanukovych's sudden decision not to sign a political association and free trade agreement with the European Union. For eight years he was told that the Maidan was the worst thing that could happen. And I say: How do I explain to you what the Maidan is, if you don't understand what the will of the people is? According to Zolkin, most Russians never considered Ukraine an independent state.
Zolkin claimed to have interviewed Russian pilot Alexander Krasnoyartsev, who reportedly killed a civilian after trying to escape from a downed plane. I ask him: Do you understand that you are not merely a mechanism that is given orders? Zolin said that you are responsible for your actions and that you are a human being.