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POWs at Ukrainian camps forced to engage in senseless labor — LPR ombudswoman

Viktoriya Serdyukova stressed that currently those released from imprisonment have been taken to one of the republic’s medical facilities "where they will remain for a long time to receive treatment"

LUGANSK, November 10. /TASS/. LPR servicemen captured by Ukraine were forced to engage in meaningless activities, dragging stones from one place to another in any weather conditions without a chance to take a break or warm up, the LPR’s human rights commissioner Viktoriya Serdyukova told TASS on Thursday following her interaction with a group of released prisoners of war.

According to her, the POWs were housed in barracks at night while from 8 am to 10 pm they were outside regardless of the weather. "They could neither sit down nor get inside, they had to perform the most senseless work, for example, to carry stones from a pile to one end of the yard and then drag the same stones back. And that’s day in and day out, from month to month," she added.

The absence of basic medical aid impacted the health of all those who had been imprisoned and they all will require lengthy rehabilitation, the ombudswoman noted. "All of them came back sick. Those who had some health problems were almost never treated. Everybody was forced to work, including the wounded. Even those prisoners with a common cold had their problems exacerbated because of the absence of any aid and this resulted in complications," she added.

The human rights commissioner stressed that currently those released from imprisonment have been taken to one of the republic’s medical facilities "where they will remain for a long time to receive treatment."

Earlier on Thursday, acting head of the LPR Leonid Pasechnik reported that a group of 35 servicemen of the LPR People’s militia returned from Ukrainian captivity. As Serdyukova specified, it included those troops involved in the November 3 exchange with the Ukrainian side as well as a couple of people swapped at the end of October.