Ukrainian security agent: POWs are nothing but business for Kiev

Ukraine’s National Security Service officers put people on the list of prisoners of war (POWs) for money, says Gayde Rizayeva, a Ukrainian security agent detained by the law-enforcers of the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR).

“For the Kiev authorities, prisoners are nothing, but business,” Rizayeva says.  According to her, such organizations as Partiot and Vladimir Ruban’s Dnepropetrovsk-based Center for Release of POWs have been created to gain profits.  Patriot organization belongs to Vyacheslav Grishayev, Oleg Kotenko and other officers of Ukraine’s National Security Service who gain extra profits from the exchange of prisoners and from what Rizayeva called a pseudo-volunteer activity.  “They claim enormous sums for their services,” she said.

The detained agent says even the punitive battalions that accompany the POWs try to cash on the exchange of prisoners.  Alfa security forces jointly with Aidar fighters take by 5,000 hryvnias per exchange, Rizayeva said. Furthermore, exchanging “all for all” is not favorable for the Ukrainian security officers that make money on it.  Since August 2014, when the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) Commission for POWs was set up, 550 captured security officers have been repatriated to Kiev.  “Ukraine returned 564 prisoners, of which less than 200 were militia,” says Lilia Rodionova, a member of the DPR Commission for POWs.