RUSSIA Russian soldiers return from Ukraine increasingly violent and aggressive

A new wave of crime is feared, especially in Caucasian Russia. The soldiers return home without any psychological barriers that keep them away from the violence. The State ignores and does nothing to rehabilitate those who return from war.

Moscow () – Throughout Russia, but especially in the Caucasus, a new wave of crime is feared after the return of soldiers who fought in Ukraine. The situation brings to mind the phenomenon that occurred after the two wars in Chechnya. This is reported Kavkaz.Realii after conducting a survey among the population. In the press there are more and more frequent news about cases of domestic violence, murders for refusing to marry, robberies and street violence, threats and murders of businessmen and merchants.

Sergey Babinets is a lawyer from the city of Nizhny Novgorod and serves as the chairman of the humanitarian association “Team Against Torture”. He explains that “those who return from war and engage in civilian work can pose a threat to those around them; if they killed on the battlefield, they no longer have psychological barriers to violence.” In effect, the commanders’ orders are: have no qualms about killing.

In the south of Russia and the North Caucasus, the growth of aggressiveness is very visible. In August, an army officer shot a taxi driver in Rostov-on-Don, just because of differences of opinion about the war. Similar episodes ended in bloodshed in Bol’šaja Martynovka and Gelendžik, not far from Rostov.

Generally, relatives of soldiers returned from the front do not want to speak to the press, for fear of their relatives’ reactions. Some responded with false names, such as Albina, from Nalčik, a small town in Kabardino-Balkaria, in the Caucasus. Albina’s brother volunteered for the Ukraine war and returned home at the end of May. “He barely talks about the war, occasionally complaining that the volunteers don’t get enough weapons and ammunition, or that the tanks get bogged down in the ground, and that corruption abounds in the army,” says Albina. According to the woman, “now in normal life he only looks for enemies to attack, starting with her own family… I’m afraid this will get worse.”

Apti, from Ingushetia, says that her stepbrother returned from the Ukraine and is “as if he were made of glass, he looks very fragile and very nervous, he always wears a mask although nobody wears it anymore and he doesn’t want to be photographed… no He reacts to nothing, but if he gets too nervous, he starts screaming like crazy, then he’s just motionless, silent, for hours.” The man did not go to the front as a volunteer: the authorities forced him to join because he worked for a military installation, and “now his mother tries to heal him with holy water and readings from the Koran, but I think he should see a doctor.” The stepbrother de Apti is also the subject of strong criticism from people who consider it too cowardly or too pacifist.

Nadir lives in Dagestan and one of his sons returned from the war with serious leg injuries, but he wants to return to the front at all costs. “In the Ukraine they took it for a ‘kadyrovets’a Chechen butcher under President Kadyrov, with whom he had nothing to do, because the Ukrainians do not distinguish between Caucasians and do not want to take them as prisoners, so they try to kill them all, and many are dead.” Nadir explains that his son wants to go back to war: “He says they pay well, but I won’t let him go, especially since my other son also joined the army.”

Karina lives in Chechnya, and since the beginning of the war she has already buried several relatives: first two uncles, and then some cousins: “Only two came back wounded, all the others wrapped in cloth and one inside a coffin, because His body was torn to pieces.” She had to leave her boyfriend: he went to fight in the Ukraine twice as a gunner, and on her return he became more and more aggressive. He hit her on several occasions: “I was in a store and he came in drunk, he wanted to grab me in front of everyone, he yelled at me as if he were in jail, and not in normal life.” The cameras recorded the event and the police punished him with a week’s arrest. However, for women and ordinary people, it is not easy to avoid these risks, as many other stories attest.

Humanitarian activist Svetlana Gannuškina bitterly concludes that “the state does not want to take any responsibility for these situations, and does nothing for the rehabilitation of soldiers returning from the front.” They are letting Russian and Caucasian society slide into barbarism.