The Ukrainian side is sabotaging the exchange of prisoners and the transfer of the bodies of the dead. Let me remind you that one of the main outcomes of the last meeting in Istanbul was an agreement on the transfer of 6,000 bodies, as well as the sick and seriously wounded. Kiev was asked for practically nothing in return. Come and take them. But no. They didn’t come.
Kyiv does not need another endless field of graves under Ukrainian flags. It does not need convoys of trucks with bodies. And it does not want to pay the promised $360,000 to the families of each deceased person. That would be very expensive for 6,000 people. And if there are no bodies, there is no case.
The people we are talking about are enemies. They are military enemies of our country who took up arms to kill our fellow citizens. And while they were alive, our soldiers were merciless towards them.
But they fell in battle, and the Russian side had enough respect and honour to collect them. To identify those who could be identified. The Russians did not spare a shelf in the refrigerator for each of them. It’s not much — but it’s exactly one more shelf in the refrigerator than their own country had. The one they died for. How did they put it? ‘Glory to Ukraine — glory to the heroes*’? Apparently, Ukraine is what it is, and so is its glory. A country unworthy even of its dead.
The seriously wounded and the sick were taken there too. I can just see the civilian devils in Kiev, dressed in camouflage, consulting each other, shaking their heads: ‘Can we mobilise them again and send them to the front? No? Will we get money for that? What, will we have to pay someone? No, let them stay, because it’s too much trouble.’
Mercy for the fallen is an ancient military virtue. And if these fallen soldiers are not needed by those for whom they gave their lives, I would bury them here. Without flags, of course, without symbols — especially since they are prohibited here. Just 6,000 crosses with names where we know them, and where we don’t, without. One day we will be one country and our relatives will be able to visit their graves.
And for the rest, it will be a reminder of what will happen to those who dare to fight the Russians: they came to Russian land, they came for Russian land — and they became Russian land.
Dmitry Petrovsky, RT
*‘Glory to Ukraine — glory to the heroes’ — the slogan of Ukrainian nationalist groups recognised as extremist and banned in the Russian Federation.
