June 3, 2016

Political prisoners must not be forgotten

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Dear Editor:

It’s great news that the Ukrainian helicopter pilot kidnapped by Russian forces two years ago and sentenced on trumped-up charges to 22 years’ imprisonment has been freed in a swap for two Russian military intelligence (GRU) soldiers captured in Ukraine.

Ms. Savchenko’s dignified and courageous behavior as she was sentenced to 22 years in jail after a drawn-out sham trial in Moscow made her a symbol of Ukraine’s defiance against all the odds in its war with Russia.

While Ms. Savchenko returned to a hero’s welcome in Ukraine, the GRU guys, Yevgeny Yerofeyev and Alexander Alexandrov, probably felt very apprehensive on their way home. When the two armed men were captured by Ukrainian forces in May of last year in eastern Ukraine’s combat zone, both said they were from GRU. Later, on Moscow’s directions, they retracted that admission, but the damage had been done. Not only were they more evidence of regular Russian military fighting in Ukraine – something the Kremlin, despite an abundance of other Russian regulars caught in Ukraine, has denied – but they were also from the supposedly elite GRU forces.

While Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko sent his own plane to collect Ms. Savchenko and ecstatically greeted her, it was an excellent bet that the two GRU men would not receive awards for heroism or any public acclaim, let alone a friendly meeting with Vladimir Putin. More likely, the duo will be dismissed from the GRU in disgrace and suffer some other punishment administered in sneaky, nasty Kremlin style for allowing themselves to be captured alive and for the revelations that embarrassed their mendacious president.

Now the same sort of support that helped free Ms. Savchenko by keeping her plight publicized in Ukraine and throughout the world is essential to pressure Moscow to release the other Ukrainian political prisoners it holds. These are all innocent people – many ethnic Crimean Tatars – persecuted because they refused to bow before the Russian invasion.

Among them are Oleh Sentsov and three others, Hennadiy Afanasyev, Oleksiy Chyrniy, Oleksandr Kolchenko, who were arrested in Crimea for opposing the Russian invasion there and have been falsely accused of membership in paramilitary groups. Other prisoners whose names are known include: Yurii Yatsenko, Bohdan Yarichevsky, Mykola Karpyuk and Stanislav Klykh. More than 20 Crimean Tatars have disappeared after being snatched from their homes or off the streets in Crimea and are presumed murdered. Others have been arrested by Russian authorities.

Many of the prisoners have told their lawyers they were tortured by being beaten, having electric shocks administered, having gas masks strapped on to deprive them of air or inject noxious gas, and being threatened with rape with a soldering iron.

Nobody could blame the prisoners if they signed confessions to gain their freedom. But from somewhere they summon the courage and strength to carry on their resistance. Like political prisoners the world over, savagely persecuted for their ideas, these are among the bravest and best of human beings and must not be forgotten.

Washington

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