Russian forces mine bodies of their dead soldiers

This is reported by Sky News. 

According to Oleksandr, an anaesthesiologist of the 128 Brigade who treats combat wounds at a frontline field hospital, landmines took a tremendous toll in the first month of the counteroffensive in June.

The number of wounded arriving at his hospital has significantly decreased since the mines forced commanders to delay their advance. 

Volodymyr, a sapper, said he was on the frontlines conducting his duty when his team discovered the bodies of Russian troops in an abandoned position. 

"There were three or four of their dead. Two guys were lying on each other, which made us suspicious, because if there had been an explosion they would have been thrown in different directions, but here, one is lying on the other," he said. 

"We did well by not touching them, because when we reached there with a 'kitten', we saw that under them was an anti-personnel mine."

The kitten is a folding steel hook used by sappers to dismantle booby traps, so named because of its retractable tongs that spring out like cat's claws. 

"It exploded and blew up both of them, but we stayed safe, thank God," he added.

"We lose one sapper every day, either wounded or dead. It's a dangerous job. And whether a whole brigade is advancing or around 12 guys go out on their mission, it's always the sappers that go first,” Ukrainian serviceman told Sky News.

The Russians "mine everything. Open doors, boxes and crates, even toys," he added. 

Even their own dead: "They know that our med-evac groups lift the wounded and the dead, under which they then find these explosives. And this is very dangerous for us."

• On July 19, military expert Serhiy Zgurets explained that during the counteroffensive the Ukrainian Armed Forces operate in small units, whose advance is preceded by sappers. These are 4 or 5 trained fighters who, at dusk, when it is impossible to detect them either by thermal imagers or visually, manually clear the territory of mines in narrow corridors.

• On July 21, Ukrainian military said that their approach to Russian positions is hampered by dense mining. “We see everything the USSR, and then Russia, accumulated after World War II. With all the mines that Russia has, it mines our territory. And this slows down the movement of our equipment,” Oleksandr Kurbatov, a spokesman for the 128th Detached Brigade of the Territorial Defense Forces, said.

• Liberation of Staromayorske in Donetsk region took place on heavily mined territory.