On 8 June, several Telegram channels posted a video of Lieutenant Colonel of the Russian Armed Forces, commander of the 72nd Motorized Rifle Brigade Roman Vinivitin. In the video, he reported torture by the mercenaries of PMC Wagner.
The press service of Yevgeny Prigozhin, Wagner’s leader, posted a video of the captured Vinivitin earlier, taken in May.
PMC Wagner claimed that the Russian military personnel mined the road the mercenaries were supposed to use to leave Bakhmut. When the mercenaries tried to clear the territory of mines, their positions were allegedly fired upon by the Russian regular military.
During the shootout, Wagner’s Ural truck was damaged. After that, the mercenaries “took measures to eliminate the aggression and detain” Vinivitin.
On the same day, Prigozhin published a video of the “detained” lieutenant colonel. In the video, he says that he fired at the Wagner vehicle due to personal hostility, in a drunken state.
After being released from captivity, Vinivitin recorded a new video. In it, he referred to himself as the former commander of the 72nd brigade, spoke out against PMC Wagner, and also told his vision of what had happened.
According to the lieutenant colonel, he was driving around his units when PMC fighters blocked his path. He allegedly disarmed them, but then he was still taken prisoner.
“I was captured, kept in a basement, and they tortured me in the way that no enraged Russian soldier would ever torture a Ukrainian serviceman. I was beaten, deprived of sleep, and one night they would simply drag me out of the basement and try to shoot me dead three times. The video of my interrogation was filmed under pressure,” the serviceman said in the video.
He also called the accusation of intentionally mining the Wagner retreat zone nonsense. According to the serviceman, the Russian military carried out actions in their area of responsibility. At the same time, Vinivitin did not deny the “tension” in relations with the mercenaries.
The serviceman said that the confrontation began a long time ago. Allegedly, it started when PMC Wagner stole two tanks, “four guns”, a Kamaz truck, and an infantry fighting vehicle from the military.
“There was a case related to the threat of physical reprisal against the fighters of an EW company who were threatened to be encircled and “zeroed out” only because they did not work the way PMC Wagner wanted.
A starshina [sergeant major] of one of our battalions was kidnapped, he was tormented, tortured, they splashed acid into his eyes, and doused him with gasoline. Our Chief of Staff was abducted, beaten and thrown out tied up in a combat area,”
Vinivitin stated.
The officer also mentioned that he heard a rumour that “a fighter from another unt was [sodomised, raped] by the Wagner mercenaries”. The officer then committed suicide.
Moreover, Vinivitin says Wagner’s mercenaries kidnapped servicemen several times, trying to exchange them for munitions.
In May, members of the Storm Z unit recorded a 40-minute video complaining about their commanders, including Roman Vinivitin.
The deputy commander of the unit, Major Alexander Prikazchikov, claimed that Vinivitin was “killing personnel, carrying out criminal work and giving criminal orders.” The lieutenant colonel allegedly threatened to kill his subordinates who did not obey his order.
The military men also complained that they were left stranded near the village of Troitske without communication and artillery support.
