The monster next door: responding to the execution and torture of Ukrainian POWs

I watched a video in which a Russian soldier cuts off the genitals of a Ukrainian soldier in Severodonetsk with a paper knife. It is confirmed - he is a Ukrainian soldier.  His name, brigade and the circumstances of his capture are all being clarified. The executioner has already been identified as Vitaly Aroshanov, a Russian citizen of Kalmyk origin. He is now a wanted man. Meanwhile he is alive out there, somewhere in our land.

The search for "good Russians" among Russians and also among representatives of all the smaller nations that comprise the Russian Federation can end here. I am not interested in either their history or their wanderings. Since they’re Russified and have Russian passports, they have become pure evil. We did not invite the Russians, Tuvans, Buryats, or Kadyrov’s men here. They came to kill us, as a nation, in order to erase the most sacred thing that saved us for 300 years of colonization: "and there will be a race, and there will be people."

Could our fighter survive this torture? I know that people need a ray of hope so as not to fall or give in to despair.

I'll be honest: after torture, blood loss, pain, and shock, they cannot survive. This is execution in its purest form. After watching this video, I understood why some of our heroes blew themselves up to avoid falling into the hands of these monsters. Why did several of our captured defenders of Mariupol say to their mothers: "I will not surrender to the ‘evacuation’. I want to die with honor." Not all of them have children left, which means that a good Ukrainian family has been cut off at the very root - and if this continues there will be nobody left to walk beside, in unison.

Castration and genital cutting is nothing new. This was known in narrow circles since 2014, but then the mainstream media, volunteers, and the authorities wanted to protect the general public from the full horror of these events. And our heroes were recorded among the figures for suicides. "Here in Chernivtsi, an ATO soldier threw himself from a high-rise building after that. Neighbors gathered for the funeral from neighboring houses. There were two more cases in Dnipro, veterans hanged themselves," says volunteer Tetyana Sobko.

Also, every time I sincerely rejoice through tears, when I know that my dead acquaintances have at least one child left - and there will be a family, the line will continue, and there will be people. I advise all mobilized men not to be ashamed of reproductive technologies so that they have the opportunity to have a child one day. Because the time will surely come when yesterday's ferocious warrior takes up more homely duties, strapping on not a rifle but a baby carrier. "For a few days, for the first time in 5 months, they let me go on the weekend. What a blessing it is to go to the pool with my daughter," my friend, fighter and patriot Hryhoriy Lyakhovych tells me right now on the phone.

It hurt me to watch the video of the execution. But I do not feel fear - there is a burning disgust for everything Russian and a desire to make the Ukrainian Armed Forces more effective here and now.

I clearly see the intention of the Russian occupiers. First, mutilate our women so that they never have intimacy and do not give birth to children. Then to intimidate our men before decisive battles - telling them to “Run or we will catch you and strip you of the opportunity to have descendants, to continue your family.” This is calculated to push Ukraine toward a truce, to freeze the war within its current borders. And then, after a couple of years, everything will start again with new force - torture, executions, rape, and mass graves in flowerbeds.

For at least two months, the Russians have been playing the POW card and using hostages. In April, militants from the so-called "DPR" captured British volunteer Paul Ury and tortured him to death. In July, an obituary was issued stating that the man died of "renal and respiratory failure." It was an attempt to put pressure on Ukraine through our Western allies, so that ordinary British people put pressure on their government: "should we support Ukraine if our citizens are dying there?"

This provocation did not work. And that's why, at the moment when we expect an intensification of the fighting in the Kharkov area as well, when our troops are advancing deep into the South, the Russian forces  are trying to scare us with fear. And terror. And in addition to the castration video, there are terrifying new photos of a deliberate shooting at a bus stop in Mykolaiv. Dead dogs, murdered girls in summer sundresses, a river of human blood. This is revenge for our operation, for the liberation of southern Ukraine.

Tonight, the Russians committed a provocation by shelling the prison in Olenivka, Donetsk region, which was full of our POWs and hostages. There are mainly defenders of Mariupol, "Azovs". And I also perceive it as a moral blow to the brothers of these same heroes. I will not go into details, but it is these warriors, and men like them, who are preparing for urban battles in the south. And this is an attempt to break their morale before the heavy battles that will decide the outcome of the war.

Russia will not be convinced by "grain agreement", conversations with Blinken and the need to "save Putin's face". Even anticipating defeat, Russia is looking for ways to take more of our people to the grave. It is raising the stakes, knowing that, for Ukrainian society, the issues of captured, tortured, killed innocents at bus stops are extremely sensitive.

Our minimum priority now is maximum publicity in the West. Not as just another task on our to-do list, but to gain a clear understanding that the West is dealing with barbarians. You can't hold diplomatic talks with them, you can't shake hands, you can't sell your conscience for cheap gas. Because today Russian citizens are killing in Ukraine — tomorrow these videos may well feature German or French victims.

The abuse of captured Ukrainians has already been covered by foreign media. Julian Röpke, an investigative journalist at BILD raised the topic of Russian atrocities at the European level.

Senior adviser to the US Congress, Paul Massaro, says that the world must finally arm us with everything we need to defeat Russia.

What should ordinary Ukrainians do? It is necessary to hate for generations ahead. No Russian church has a place in Ukraine.

I don't want to see the face of any "good Russian" in Ukraine. I categorically oppose giving our passports to freedmen and non-executives. I finally demand from Zelensky to sign the law 7459 on banning Russian books in Ukraine. I don't want Russian TV series. I can't bear to hear Russian. I perceive the desire to protect Russian interests here as deliberate work for the enemy. That is it.