BARBARIC

Ukrainian Journalist Details Horrific Torture While in Russian Prison

In his first comments since his release, Oleh Baturin said he thought he would be killed for reporting on Russia’s war.

Ukrainian journalist Oleh Baturin has spoken out for the first time since his release from Russian captivity last month, detailing the cruel conditions he was kept under, solely for doing his job. “They tortured me, threatened to mutilate me, threatened to kill me,” Baturin said during a speech last week that was published in The Guardian. Baturin—who’s based in the Russian-occupied region of Kherson—said he was kidnapped by Moscow’s forces on March 12 after falling into a meeting-turned-trap. He was later taken to a makeshift prison where he was given only bits of food and water and found himself tortured for information for eight days before his release on March 20. “They wanted revenge on me as a journalist, for my professional activities,” he said, later adding: “The Russian invaders have only one goal – to break down the citizens of Ukraine, to intimidate them and to completely destroy independent journalism, to crush civil activists and journalists physically and psychologically.”