From Prison Cells to Special Units: Russia’s New Recruits

Vladimir Osechkin says he studied law because he wanted to go into law enforcement. To be a good sheriff, he tells me. But after a few bad brushes with Russia’s justice system — he says he was falsely accused of murder until police found the right man and then years later was shaken down when the car sales empire he built grew too big for its own Russian good — his plans changed.  

Both experiences he describes as terrifying and violent. Osechkin has since dedicated his life to exposing torture in Russian prisons. There is so much abuse, he says, that many inmates are finding the prospects of a bloody and uncertain future on the front lines of Ukraine appealing enough to take recruiters’ bait as Russia’s defense chiefs look to prisons to beef up the ranks of the army.

“Inside this 21st-century gulag, you can be humiliated, beaten, raped. You may be subjected to the most terrible bullying. Or you will be forced to work in the industrial zone.  From 7 a.m. to 11 p.m., or at least more than twelve hours a day, with faulty, outdated equipment, and you run the risk of losing a hand or an eye,” Osechkin tells Fox News from his home in France via Zoom. “They want to leave the torture dungeons by any means.  Many don’t realize they are likely to be killed in a week or two.”  

Osechkin runs the human rights group Gulagu.net. He himself is said to be one of Russia’s most wanted men for having circulated dramatic torture videos from a prison in Saratov and disseminating reports of discontent within the ranks of the FSB, Russia’s security services. 

RUSSIAN OFFICIALS INSIST AIR BASE EXPLOSIONS ‘ACCIDENTAL,’ SATELLITE IMAGES SHOW NEAR-IDENTICAL CRATERS

Russia for its part has said it has a fraud case against Osechkin.  Fraud charges in Russia many say are liberally used for anyone the Kremlin has in its crosshairs, like Alexei Navalny.

Osechkin calls the active recruitment of Russian prisoners for work on the front lines of the war a cynical act. According to his sources — he gets tips from a range of people including prisoners’ families — these efforts have been recently stepped up. 

The army wants sappers as the Russian military has lost quite a few and it takes many years to train de-miners up. Russia,…