Articles By Mitzi - Mitzi Perdue

Articles By Mitzi Perdue

Mitzi’s 251 Articles

Russia’s Ugly Prisoner Exchanges

Apr 8, 2024

https://mitziperdue.com/russias-ugly-prisoner-exchanges

Boris Semenov, (not his real name) from Bucha, Ukraine had an experience at the hands of the Russian invaders that’s so foreign to us in the West that’s it’s hard for us to process. Still, his story is worth knowing for the insight it gives into what Ukraine is up against.

I interviewed Semenov last month in a Kyiv police station. He wasn’t there as a prisoner, but rather as a man who was part of a prisoner exchange. The Ukrainian police were part of conducting the prisoner exchange.

Semenov is Ukrainian, but he’s ethnically Russian and grew up speaking Russian. He’s 49 years old, and his lined, haggard face, greying hair, and stiff movements make him appear in his 80s. He’s probably 20 pounds underweight, and his breathing looks labored.

“On March 5^th”, he begins the interview, “my friend and I went to look for water in our village.”

He needed to get water because one of the first things the Russian invaders did when they occupied his town was, they shot up the water pipes, rendering them inoperable. “As we were walking along a village road,” he continued, “we suddenly came across four Russian soldiers. They pointed their guns at us and ordered us to strip to our underwear and lie on the ground. It was 20 degrees.”

Semenov is silent a moment and then continues. “They began calling us Nazis. I tried to explain to them that I wasn’t a Nazi.”

As Semenov tells it, one of the four soldiers didn’t appreciate his arguing, and with the butt of his submachine gun struck Semenov in the face, knocking out four of his teeth. The Russians tied his hands behind his back and then wrapped duct tape around his head, covering his eyes.

The Russians brought Semenov and his friend to an interrogation center, where half a dozen Ukrainians were already being held. Semenov was still blindfolded, but he could hear that everyone ahead of him was being asked the same questions. One of the interrogators in a Chechnian accent demanded: “Where is Ukrainian army? Where are biological weapons?”

When each of the people ahead of him didn’t give the answer the interrogators apparently wanted, Semenov would hear a gunshot and screams.

Then it came his turn. He felt the cold tip of a pistol against his temple. Desperately he told his interrogator that he didn’t know anything about the military and that he was just a civilian.

His tormentors had an additional tactic designed to maximize his agonizing terror. “A guy fired a shot past my ear, and at the same moment, another gave me a horrendous slap on the temple. I knew I had been shot.”

However, he hadn’t been shot. After 24 hours of captivity, Boris and his friend were released, and they headed back to their village and safety. However, they didn’t make it home.

“As we were walking, we saw a column with 15 light tanks, and several armored personnel carriers,” he remembered. “They were having lunch like a picnic on the ground.”

The Russians waved to the two Ukrainians, indicating that they should approach. The Russians then asked why they were all covered with blood. Semenov quickly explained to them, “Your colleagues just released us and told us to go back home.”

That didn’t satisfy the leader of the column. He used his cell to call someone, and Semenov heard him say, “We just picked up a couple of Ukrainian clowns. Are you aware of them? Yes? What do you want us to do with them?”

The answer turned out to be a return to captivity. “They covered our eyes again,” Semenov said. He was already in agony from having lost four teeth, but now a man, seemingly for the sport of it, had him lie face down on the ground, spread eagle, and kicked him in the ribs, eventually breaking three ribs on each side.

Semenov and his friend were taken to Russia, where they were kept in prison for two months. For the first six weeks, they were given one meal a day and were starving. But then suddenly conditions changed. They were given plenty of food. They kept wondering why everything was changing.

On April 27^th , a little more than eight weeks after his ordeal began, Semenov was put on a plane to Belarus, and eventually to Zaporizhia where he and several other Ukrainians were exchanged for an equal number of Russian soldiers

Boris winds up his story with a long, deep sigh, and says, “I am ethnically Russian, I’ve always been proud that I’m Russian, but now I’m ashamed that I was Russian. I’m learning to speak Ukrainian now.”

Russia regularly rounds up civilians from Ukraine and uses them to exchange for Russian POWs. As of today, this ugly dance of kidnapping Ukrainians to exchange them for Russian POWs, has resulted in 20,000 prisoner swaps.

The practice needs to be condemned globally. National political leaders should request a formal investigation into Russian crimes against non-combatants. They should ask nongovernmental organizations such as the UN and OSCE to collect evidence and testimony from victims in order to build a case with the International Criminal Court.

To quote from Justice Robert Jackson, speaking at the 1945 Nuremburg Trials, “The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot survive their being repeated.” Let’s have justice for the innocent victims or Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Russian Invaders Always Attack Police

Apr 8, 2024

https://mitziperdue.com/russian-invaders-always-attack-police

When soldiers from the Russian Federation invade a country, a top priority is to incapacitate the local police. The Russians systematically bomb police stations, destroy police communications, and either steal or disable police cars. They’ve done this in each of the 12 wars they’ve been involved with since the Russian Federation was formed in in 1991. (Source)

What the Russian invaders are doing now in Ukraine follows their pattern. When I visited Ukraine for five days just before Christmas, I got some insight into why the Russian invaders make a practice of going after law enforcement.

Police play a crucial role in resisting the invasion and their professional capabilities go far beyond commonly known policing skills:

The Ukrainian police are adept at stopping infiltrators.
They know how to deal with snipers.
They are experts at de-mining.
When the power grid is down, they replace the air raid sirens, warning people of imminent rocket attacks.
As investigators, they document war crimes.

Stopping Infiltrators

Members of the Kyiv Regional Police told me about this when I was there a week ago. In a typical case, a grandmother is walking along a dirt road in her village and notices five guys walking towards her.

She quickly realizes the five are not local. She knows it’s dangerous to stare at them, but even from just a quick glance as they pass by her, she knows something isn’t right.

She’s starting to think something along the lines of, “These guys don’t fit in. They’re all in their twenties. They’re muscular. Maybe they’re infiltrators. Maybe they’re going to blow up the town’s bridge.”

In minutes, she’s contacted the police, reporting her suspicions. The police are trained to react rapidly to a situation like this. They intercept the five men, and discover they have heavy duty explosives hidden in their clothes. By intercepting the infiltrators, the police save the bridge.

Stopping Snipers

Another important way Ukrainian police help protect the country is dealing with Russian snipers. In newly liberated areas, the Russians leave behind highly-trained snipers to slow down the Ukrainian soldiers. However, the Ukrainian police have special anti-sniper units and by pinning down the Russian snipers, the Ukrainian police make it possible for their military counterparts to continue pushing forward rapidly.

De-mining

A major function of the Ukrainian Police is now de-mining. It’s a dangerous job. In Kherson recently, land mines cause the death of four police officers, and others have sustained lifelong injuries such as the loss of an eye, or a limb.

The Russians regularly leave behind mines disguised as teddy bears or dolls, or even soda cans. These mines have no military purpose, but they create mayhem and terror. On top of that, unexploded ordinances are scattered all over the areas where Russian troops were stationed or attacked.

Some of the most demonic mines the police come across are ones that look like leaves. Because these “leaves” are plastic, standard metal detectors won’t find them. As policewoman, Irina Pryanishnikova, told me, “You won’t see them unless you’re looking for them.”

The “leaves” she’s speaking of contain 10 grams of explosives. “They won’t kill you, but they’ll rip your foot off,” Pryanishnikova said.

The non-lethal amount of explosives is deliberate. The Russian invaders prefer to cause lifelong injury rather than death. A person who’s blind or lost a limb may need lifelong care, adding to an already stretched medical system.

Warning about Incoming Rockets

The air raid warnings in Kyiv depend on electricity. I experienced the air raid sirens several times while in Kyiv, and there’s typically around 30 minutes from the time a missile launch is detected to the time the POI, or Point of Impact is reached.

However, when the power system is knocked out, the air raid sirens don’t work. The police drive through the streets blasting from their loudspeakers, “Rocket attack immanent! Please proceed to the nearest bomb shelter!”

Documenting War Crimes

The Ukrainian police also document war crimes. As Pryanishnikova pointed out, “As soon as an area is liberated, we move from town to town, village to village documenting instances of attacking civilians, including rape, torture, and murder.”

Police experts collect forensic evidence, preparing for the time when those who have committed war crimes are brought to justice. According to Pryanishnikova, the Ukrainian police have over 50,000 records of war crimes the Russia invaders have committed and this number is constantly growing as more bodies are found or new facts are brought to light.

When the members of the Russian Federation invade a country, they prioritize attacking law enforcement, and they do it for good reason. The Ukrainian police, by carrying out their mission “to protect and serve,” are helping thwart the Russians’ efforts to take over their country.