1/ Russian soldiers who complained yesterday about their commander brutally beating their comrades, extorting them, and stealing from the dead, have reportedly been sent on a potentially suicidal combat mission – likely as retaliation for complaining. ⬇️
2/ The wife of Alexander Valerievich Shirinsky, a squad commander in the 506th Motorised Rifle Regiment, says that along with at least three other men "he was also brutally beaten on the night of August 24-25, tied to a tree for the whole night, his arms and legs are…
3/ …blue from the ropes, his face is covered in abrasions, he cannot walk, he also already had a wound – shrapnel in the chest, but Lt Col Voskoboev still sent him on a combat mission with shrapnel in the chest.
4/ "Now all those who suffered from his torture have been sent on a combat mission, in fact, they are the main witnesses of these crimes, there are many more victims. Battalion commander Voskoboev abuses alcohol, he is very cruel, I am very worried about my husband."
5/ According to the human rights organisation , Shirinsky said that he was beaten by four people seeking to "exert moral and physical pressure" on him. The beaten soldiers had previously not been allowed to wash, shave, or perform personal hygiene.Gulagu.net
6/ His wife says that Shirinsky is now in a very bad condition, not only from his previous shrapnel wound, but from a series of new injuries inflicted during the beating. "His arm did not move after the injury, and after all these violent actions, he cannot walk at all."
7/ "He managed to report that his arms and legs were swollen, his head and face were swollen, and cut. He repeatedly told me in conversation that his command abuses alcohol and treats its subordinates like expendable material.
8/ Today they were all sent on a combat mission and I am worried about him." /end
1/ A Russian schoolteacher mobilised despite ill health has described his time in a notorious Russian army unit. He was told to execute POWs, saw Russian deserters being tortured, and was repeatedly beaten. After he deserted, his lawyer tried to turn him in. ⬇️
2/ Ilya Elokhin is now in Armenia, seeking political asylum in the West. He says he was opposed to the war when it began and had hoped that his physical ailments would keep him out of it. However, while on sick leave from his job as a primary school teacher, he was mobilised.
3/ Elokhin was sent to the 9th Separate Guards Motorised Rifle Brigade (military unit 71443), formerly part of the 'Donetsk People's Republic' (DPR) armed forces. The unit is notorious for its mistreatment of its own members.
1/ 6,000 North Koreans are to be sent to Russia's Kursk region to help with demining and rebuilding. Additionally, Russia and North Korea are to collaborate on building memorials in Russia and North Korea and a memorial museum in Pyongyang. ⬇️
2/ Former Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu – who is now Secretary of the Russian Security Council – met Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang last week to discuss Russia-North Korea cooperation. Kim agreed to send 1,000 sappers and 5,000 construction workers to Kursk.
3/ The sappers will be employed clearing mines and other unexploded ordnance, while the construction workers – organised as a military construction battalion – will help Russia to restore infrastructure in the region.
1/ A Russian veteran of the Chechen war who has deserted from the war in Ukraine has described how poorly-equipped Russian soldiers were forced into assaults, shot by their own side if severely wounded, and stopped by Chechen 'blocking detachments' if they tried to retreat. ⬇️
2/ 42-year-old Alexander (a pseudonym) was mobilised in late 2022 and deserted in August 2023. Although he had health problems caused by his service in the second Chechen war in the early 2000s, these were ignored and he was sent to the occupied Luhansk region of Ukraine.
3/ Although he was based behind the front line, carrying out evacuations and building fortifications near Bilohorivka, his unit experienced continuous losses from Ukrainian attacks. They had to evacuate casualties from repeated failed attacks on a factory by Storm Z units.
1/ The Russian army is sending one-armed and one-legged soldiers into assaults, according to a wounded Chechen soldier who has been assigned to a so-called 'cripple battalion'. He says that the men's fitness status is systematically being falsified. ⬇️
2/ In a video appeal for help addressed to Chechnya's dictator Ramzan Kadyrov, a soldier named Suleiman Khuseinovich Borshigov identifies himself as a member of the 383rd Motorised Rifle Regiment (military unit 11086), based in Voronezh.
3/ He says: "There are sick people among us who were registered as healthy. There are even one-armed and one-legged people among us. They forged all our documents, registered us as completely healthy. They threw us into the assault squad and now they are sending us to slaughter."
1/ Poland's electoral commission has said that there were "major irregularities" in the second round of the recent presidential election, won narrowly by Karol Nawrocki. Votes appear to have been recorded wrongly, or transferred to the wrong candidate. ⬇️
2/ Nawrocki, a pro-Trump figure representing the right-wing PiS party, won by only 360,000 votes. The National Election Commission says there were "incidents that could have an impact on the outcome of the vote" requiring "an in-depth analysis of the reasons".
3/ It highlights "the occurrence of repetitive errors in the protocols of some district election commissions consisting in incorrect assignment of the number of votes cast for individual candidates" and has referred the matter to Poland's Supreme Court.
1/ Israeli operatives who have infiltrated Iran have reportedly been using unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) to attack Iranian sites with explosives. It's another echo of the unmanned systems that have been seen in Ukraine. ⬇️
2/ A video from Iran shows Iranian military personnel inspecting equipment in an Israeli "autonomous base" used to control the UGVs. The vehicles were reportedly used to make holes in Iranian defensive structures, through which explosive-laden UGVs were subsequently driven.
3/ Russia and Ukraine have both made extensive use of UGVs, employing them to carry supplies, evacuate casualties, and carry out attacks on enemy positions. As with drones, it seems that Israel has learned lessons from the Ukraine war. /end