Desperate to beef up the frontline in Ukraine, Vladimir Putin reportedly sent cannibals to fight in Ukraine.
Following in the footsteps of late Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Kremlin has been recruiting convicts for months to fight in the war against the neighbouring nation.
Those who prove themselves on the battlefield and return from Ukraine are pardoned as “Heroes of the Special Military Operation” – the name still used in Russia to refer to the full-scale invasion of the eastern European country.
Among those given the title of Heroes and walked out of the conflict as free men were two convicted killers who ate the flesh of their victims, Russian media reported by Politico have claimed.
Denis Gorin, from the Russian island of Sakhalin, previously posted pictures online while wearing a military uniform with a Z – which has become the symbol of the Russian aggression in Ukraine – according to the US news outlet.
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Gorin’s participation in the war happened despite him being sentenced in 2012 to 22 years in prison.
At the time, he had been accused of killing at least three people, with prosecutors claiming he ate the meat of at least one of his victims.
The man had already been convicted of murder and mutilation of a body in 2003 but had been released on parole in 2010.
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Nevertheless, Gorin is now a free man receiving treatment in a hospital in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, according to Russian branch of Radio Liberty Sibir.Realii.
A second man who fought in Ukraine despite being supposed to be behind bars is Nikolay Ogolobiak.
Ogolobiak was meant to be in prison until 2030 but was pardoned because he fought in Ukraine as a member of the Storm Z.
This battalion, established in April, is made up of penal military units and has reportedly been sent to fight in Avdiivka, the eastern Ukrainian city Russia has been trying to storm since October 10 at huge human and equipment losses.
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Ogolobiak is a former member of a Satanist group who was jailed for killing in 2008 two young women and, with friends, cooking and eating some of the victims’ organs.
Maksym Zhorin, a deputy commander in the Ukrainian army, wrote on messaging app Telegram referring to the Russian convicts fighting in the war: “I like the news when serial killers, maniacs, and now also cannibals return home in a hurry from the war. I hope that they will eat some more of their compatriots.”
The Russian army started recruiting prisoners months after this same tactic had been adopted by Prigozhin, who died in a plane crash in August.
The US intelligence community believes his mercenary group Wagner deployed around 40,000 convicted fighters in Ukraine – half of which, Prigozhin said, had died in the battle of Bakhmut.
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