Unknown assailant attacks lawyer on street in Rostov-on-Don for representing tortured Russian soldiers 

An unknown assailant in military uniform attacked a lawyer representing Russian soldiers who subjected to torture during their military service in Ukraine, Russian Telegram news channel Astra reported on Saturday. 

The lawyer, who requested that her name not be used, told Astra that she had taken her dog out for a walk when “some big guy came up to me and knocked into me with his shoulder. Then he punched me in the face and in the ribs. The only thing he said was: ‘You know why’.” 

“I grabbed the dog and ran. Luckily I was near the entrance to a building so I managed to run in and slam the door. The soldier continued to bang on the door,” she continued.

According to the victim, who said she planned to contact the police about the attack, the emergency room recorded bruising to the soft tissues of her face and her ribs. 

The lawyer attributed the attack to her work helping soldiers who were tortured by units of the Russian army, specifically the 5th and 110th brigades in the abandoned Petrovskaya Coal Mine in Donetsk.

On Friday Astra published an investigation into a “torture basement” at the mine, detailing how refuseniks and generally disobedient soldiers were thrown into pits, urinated on, beaten, and subjected to repeated electric shocks. 

It was in that basement, according to the Astra investigation, that the pro-Kremlin American blogger Russell Bentley, who collaborated with the state agency Sputnik, was tortured and killed in April.

The Petrovskaya Coal Mine in Donetsk is the 17th illegal basement for torturing soldiers identified by Astra in the occupied Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Ukraine to date.