In July, the "Suspilne" investigative editorial office published the article about the leadership of the 6th motorized division of the Russian Federation, whom Russian investigators accuse of torturing and killing their soldiers who refused to obey orders. The investigation was reposted by Ukrainian news outlets, as well as by the Russian media that call themselves independent and work from abroad. After the publication of the article, the editor-in-chief of the investigative office received a recording of a conversation of a Russian soldier from the 37th regiment of the 25th army who told his wife about the bad attitude of the commanders and threats from them "to reset to zero" [to kill]. While verifying the conversation, we came across posts and videos with complaints from the Russian military in Lyman area, in particular from the 25th army. They were forced to fight by threats; the wounded were not evacuated and sent on crutches to combat missions.
We are publishing this story as the continuation of the previous investigation. Both investigations prove that in Russia, the brutal treatment of its citizens is not isolated cases, but the norm. Both investigations are reminders which enemy Ukraine is fighting against, and not an attempt to evoke sympathy. There can be no sympathy for those who voluntarily and without resistance went to destroy another country and its citizens.
Warning: this article contains photos featuring blood.
A phone call from "sweetheart"
On August 19, Inna Biletska, the editor-in-chief of the investigative office, received a Telegram message from a person named "Halyna". The woman wrote that she had seen Inna’s comments under a post on the Telegram channel with a link to our investigation, which was reposted by the Russian opposition website "Meduza".
"Our authorities do not respond to citizens’ appeals in any way. I heard that measures had been taken after your investigation," the woman wrote and attached an audio recording. "This is the conversation of Aleksandr Rasputin, the conscripted serviceman of the 37th regiment of the 25th army."
Halyna’s message informed that the soldier was speaking to a woman named Yekaterina and provided their phone numbers.
Halyna did not answer clarifying questions, and then blocked the contact.
The 13-minute recording, which she sent, is a conversation of a man and a woman who are probably in a relationship. They address each other "sunny", "bunny", "sweetheart". The woman also mentioned that "August will start tomorrow" and the audio recording itself is dated July 31, 2024.
We assumed that the conversation took place exactly on this day.
As the journalists of the investigative editorial office established, the received audio recording is a conversation between Anatoly and Yekaterina Zlobin from Irkutsk region. Photo from Anatoly Zlobin’s page on the Russian social media
First, the couple discussed the woman’s household chores and the possibility of making phone calls in the future. We assumed that the man was not calling from his own phone: he mentioned that he would phone the next time when someone would walk past his position.
Then the man began to complain about the heavy shelling, and the woman tried to reassure him: if he is not allowed to get a furlough, everything should be over by the end of November.
"Terrible things are happening here. The guys want to run away because terrible things are happening here," the man said.
"Don’t do it, don’t do it. [You will get into] a penal battalion," the woman answers. "Don’t do it. You will be sentenced".
"They reset to zero [kill]," the man responds. "Honey, they reset to zero. If you do not go there, they (unintelligible — ed.) and reset to zero. The guys run away not because of fatigue, but because (unintelligible — ed.). There is no way out."
"Bastards. I hope you are not thinking about this?"
"Not yet," the man answers. "But who knows what will happen."
"You are scaring me again and again."
"I do not want to die. Especially in this way."
The man also said that several soldiers had been beaten with baseball bats for refusing to obey orders.
"Our [military] did this, right?" the woman asked again.
"Yes."
"Do they provide you with food and everything else?"
"Well, honey, we are providing ourselves. Supplies are brought to the point where it is more or less safe, where there is no shelling. The distance to that point is 15-20 kilometers. It means we need to carry 60 kilograms on foot. First, these 60 kilograms is a heavy load, and second, "birds" (drones — ed.) fly, shells hit, shrapnel. It is a hard task to survive such a journey. It is about survival."
"I am dreaming of a vacation. August will start tomorrow," says the woman.
"Believe me, everyone here is dreaming of it... The guys are already warning their wives and relatives that terrible things are happening here in order civilians to get to know what is going on."
"You are in Krasnyi Lyman area, aren’t you?"
"Yes. 25th army, 37th regiment," the man responds.
"The 3rd company, right?"
"Yes. You know the name and the call sign."
"If I start complaining, I will smash everything into pieces. But won’t it affect you?"
"You need to go to the administration, to ask questions. So that people get to know and rebel... We wanted to record a joint video about what is happening and what to do."
The woman replied that she had already seen similar videos on social media, and there were posts about such things in the Viber group. This was the end of the conversation.
The phone numbers provided by Halyna on Telegram belong to the residents of Irkutsk region Aleksandr Rasputin and Yekaterina Zlobina. However, we assume that Yekaterina was talking not to Rasputin, but to her husband, Anatoly Zlobin.
To check the information, we invented a legend and sent a message to Aleksandr. We wrote that we were looking for a missing uncle. The man confirmed that he was from the 3rd company of the 37th regiment. He added that the 3rd company is part of the first battalion.
However, the voice of Aleksandr, with whom the journalist spoke, was different from the voice in the audio recording.
We also contacted Yekaterina. Her Telegram profile states that she works for the Russian Guard. We wrote to her that we were journalists and had the audio recording of her conversation with the husband. We asked whether she wanted to speak. The woman answered, "It is a mess at the war, I tell you. If I tell everything, my [husband] might be affected, so for now we are keeping silence."
"To reset to zero is a usual thing here"
While looking for the information about the 37th regiment of the 25th army, we came across the closed Telegram group "Insider ZOV" with the complaints and news from the Russian military mainly from "Krasnyi Lyman" and "Kupiansk" areas.
Most of the complaints from the 25th army are about furloughs and supplies. The servicemen say that only officers get furloughs and even complaints from relatives do not help. As for the supplies, those who are in the first line do not receive food and water, because they are not brought.
In addition, there are stories on the channel about "resetting to zero" — when the Russian military kill their fellow servicemen.
In the group, there is a post about the 37th regiment dated April 21, 2024: "We had to retreat a little as the Ukrainians destroyed us. However, it is even better for us because we can now at least raise our heads. It was dangerous to do this in the previous positions. One officer said that we would be reset to zero and there would be no problems with us then. There were a lot of problems because of us, he said. There were complaints about the lack of furloughs and incomplete payments. They did not even want to give us permission to retreat a little to save personnel."
June 25: "The Russian military can reset to zero their fellow servicemen for any kind of disobedience. They are just wild. I remember two people were killed and it was said that the Ukrainians did it. One was tied to a tree and beaten, and then thrown out. The second was taken to the evacuation point. There are no vehicles to evacuate people or bring water. If inspections start here, many people will confirm that the things happening here are not normal. The 25th army is a kind of curse."
On August 14, tying to trees was again mentioned on the Telegram channel in a post about convicts in storming groups: "The wounded are tied to trees so that there is no risk they will get to the hospital. They are convicts but I feel pity for them because they are treated like animals. It is good that there is no shelling... And the prosecutor’s office is still looking for a reason to refuse [the appeals] instead of coming to check with an unannounced visit."
August 24: "It seems that they want to reset us to zero. A large number of corpses have been lying in the trenches since winter, they are taken away, and some have already turned into skeletons. During this period, the front has moved, but very few bodies were taken out. As far as I heard, they were quietly buried somewhere near Luhansk and that is all."
In October 2023, "resetting to zero" was also mentioned: "It is said we are going to attack. However, it will be after the convicts break through the first line. The commander warned he would personally shoot everyone who would try to retreat. Everyone is scared. However, nobody does anything. To reset to zero is a common thing here. I did not know one could get used to it. However, I am used to it now."
The 37th regiment was also mentioned in another post: "We were recently brought here. Do you know what it was like to meet the deputy company commander? He made such a speech that I wanted to shoot him instead of following his orders. He said nobody would surrender in his unit. Either you have to shoot yourself, or he will shoot you. He does not care, he said. He said that if he shoots us, he will then simply destroy our documents and that is all: there will be no traces of us and we will turn into fertilizer. He encourages people to shoot themselves so that their relatives receive payments, but he does not say that the relatives will not receive anything in this case."
On June 30, a video of Yevgeny and Igor Valetov was posted in the group. They are the servicemen of the 1009th regiment of the 6th army that mostly consists of conscripts from Pskov region:
"Yesterday we stormed Vovchansk. The storm failed. Everyone was wounded, some ran away. I do not know their fate: maybe wounded, maybe killed. My brother and I were wounded. We are severely wounded. We managed to provide first aid to each other and to get to the forest. The commanders say that tomorrow we will have to go and storm this building again. However, we cannot do this because the whole body hurts, we are all wounded, and we simply have no strength. I am addressing the military prosecutor’s office, the president of the Russian Federation. Please, intervene and resolve this issue. Why send wounded, exhausted people into battle? It is just to send them to death."
To the frontline on crutches
A day before the post of the Valetov brothers, a video from the 26th tank regiment of the 47th division appeared in the group. 23 servicemen of the Russian Federation, some of whom were on crutches, complained:
"We, more than 50 people, have arrived from hospitals. We are the remnants of three companies. Our command took us to the site, and now sends us in groups to perform combat tasks. However, everyone here needs surgery and inpatient treatment. The combat medics cannot do anything and say this is the decision of the command... Reports on sending to the medical examination are not accepted."
There was a similar story on the Telegram channel about 30-year-old Stanislav Vitort, the serviceman of the 82nd regiment of the 69th division of the Russian Federation. First, there appeared his video, in which he complained that he was sent on crutches to a training ground in Luhansk region.
Later, another video was recorded by Stanislav’s wife, Daria. She noted that her husband was a volunteer who signed the contract.
"In March, in "Lyman-1" area, my husband was wounded in his left leg, suffered a concussion and traumatic brain injury. The concussion caused complications to the eye — inflammation of the optic nerve, the condition of the eye is getting worse and worse. He is almost blind in one eye. In the hospital, he underwent surgery and the shrapnel fragments were removed. One of the fragments was quite deep, and the surgeon probably damaged the tendons. This caused complications, and he cannot fully extend his leg. He cannot move without a stick or crutches."
Daria noted that before being discharged from the hospital, Stanislav was examined by the military medical commission "in absentia". Later, he was sent to a distribution camp in Luhansk region, "where he repeatedly tried to file a report about the need for further treatment, about the military medical commission, about rehabilitation."
"Political officer "Taiga" constantly tried to put a spoke in the wheel, the reports were lost or not accepted. He continued his attempts and one day was taken to a hospital in Luhansk. The chief doctor insisted on a medical examination in Russia because they did not have the needed equipment," says Daria. She adds that despite the doctor’s recommendation, her husband was left in the distribution camp, then sent to the training ground on crutches, and then to Belgorod "to perform combat missions."
"The sergeant major with the call sign "Father" began to threaten him that he would be sent to be cannon fodder, would be sent to hell without a chance of survival. He [the sergeant] said that he did not care about my husband’s family and children. We have four children, and I am pregnant. He said that he did not care and there would be no dismissal."
According to Daria, after she made this story public, "Taiga" took away her husband’s phone and said that he would be sent to Shebekino "for slaughter".
In the comments to the post, Daria added that she had addressed a lawyer. We messaged her for more details. The woman agreed, but asked to show the ID of a Russian journalist, which we could not provide.
When we were preparing this article, another post about the Kupiansk area appeared on the Telegram channel: "One guy was taken away. He was passing the medical examination, and he was taken to a UAZ vehicle. They said he would pass the examination in another place. Those who were in touch with him say that the phone was taken away. Now everyone is being taken there: squint-eyed, lame people — everyone is being taken. They take away not only phones, but also documents. There are more and more appeals on the Internet that people are taken without a medical examination after being wounded. They apparently decided to hide the situation and pack everyone so that people do not have time to complain... I have never seen that at least one commander was punished for sending the wounded to a combat mission. And the guys are just disappearing one by one."
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