A damning new investigation has revealed horrific torture complexes used by Russian army commanders to force terrified citizens to fight and die on the front lines in Ukraine for Vladimir Putin’s special military operation.
Independent media outlet ASTRA uncovered a series of what it described as “torture cellars” where mobilized soldiers are allegedly handcuffed, beaten and forced to go to war.
At one specific location – a destroyed building on the territory of the headquarters of the 272nd motorized rifle regiment in the Nizhny Novgorod region – men are illegally detained and subjected to horrific violence.
Shocking images show the inside of this factory, a factory of suffering, along with another site in Russian-occupied Ukraine, where inmates are seen handcuffed and cowering in fear.
Officially, none of these sites exist, but they are designed to bend the will of each and every inmate, forcing them to accept being sent to the meat grinder.
Independent media outlet ASTRA uncovered a series of what it described as “torture cellars”
Shocking images show the inside of this factory of suffering
Inmates at the facility are illegally detained and subjected to horrific violence to force them to return to war.
The precarious conditions at the Nizhny Novgorod facilities
In Nizhny Novgorod, men are kept under military police supervision for days without water, food or toilets, the outlet’s investigation found.
They are kept “like cattle” under the supervision of ruthless Captain Bogdan Romanov, the outlet suggested, adding that inmates are often prohibited from undergoing medical examinations or surgeries, despite many having war wounds.
One mutilated soldier was even held there despite having lost a leg, according to ASTRA.
At least three of those arrested were beaten with a police baton and sent back to war, while others were terrorised with powerful Airsoft grenades that look exactly like the real thing.
Meanwhile, in another “concentration camp” in the Russian-occupied Donetsk region, a “torture conveyor chain” is operating at the abandoned Petrovskaya mine.
Among the prisoners are soldiers who refused to take part in the famous attacks of Russian “meat grinders” at the front.
Others are arrested for trying to escape or for other alleged transgressions.
The Petrovskaya site is also a place where people considered enemies of Russia are mistreated or exterminated.
One of the alleged inmates was Russell Bentley, an American citizen who fought on the side of pro-Putin forces in Ukraine following the annexation of Crimea in 2014.
The 63-year-old Texan turned Putin apologist He was an outspoken advocate of war, but is said to have clashed with the Donetsk authorities.
Bentley was reported dead 11 days after she went missing in the Donetsk region in April.
According to ASTRA, he was “tortured in the Petrovskaya mine” and may have died there.
Prisoners sit on a military bed at the Petrvoskaya mine in Donetsk
This image shows how inmates are handcuffed to each other, some also chained to bed frames and pipes to prevent them from escaping.
Ilya Ivanov, the alleged mastermind of the Russian 5th Brigade torture camp in Donetsk
One alleged inmate of the Donetsk mine was Russell Bentley, an American citizen who fought on the side of pro-Putin forces in Ukraine.
The Donetsk torture complex is believed to be supervised by Ilya Ivanov, deputy commander of the 5th Motorized Rifle Brigade.
Their commanders force their subordinates to carry out “meat raids” by torturing them, according to some soldiers who were unlucky enough to pass through there.
“They take soldiers there with bags over their heads,” said one former prisoner.
‘They don’t feed them. They give you a bag if you want to go to the bathroom.
“When they locked me up, they hung us from the ceiling with chains by our arms and legs.”
But this prison is also used by brigade commanders to profit from the war, according to the ASTRA report.
Donetsk human rights activist Maksim Vedoprav said of the purpose of the torture mine: “It’s not just sadism. There is one main reason: money.”
The terrorist prison operates a scam by receiving salaries from the Russian military and compensation payments for men intimidated in its dungeons, he said.
‘If you shoot a man in the legs, you get 3 million roubles (£25,500) for the wound. They draw up a power of attorney for their people.
‘If a man dies, you will receive 6 million rubles (£51,000) for the dead man.
‘And while he serves them, although he actually sits in a basement (cell), they receive 200,000 (£1,700) from him (in salary payments) every month.
‘Excellent business. In fact, the first thing they do to all those who sit in the basement is to take away their pay card or force them to rewrite a power of attorney for payments to fictitious persons.
“Every single one of them is in the basement, but none of them get their money.”