“Physically I am tired, but morally relieved that many people have been able to learn the truth.” These words are those of Pavel Filatyev, an elite soldier in the Russian army who fled the fighting and who published a lengthy logbook in early August entitled ZOV, like the letters visible on the vehicles of the Russian army.
His unit, the 56th Guards Air Assault Regiment, participated in the first assault on Ukraine. After receiving the ammunition and the morphine in the cas de blessure, on the night of February 23, au milieu de la nuit, lui et ses comrades soldiers sont positioned dans la ville d’Armiansk, sans savoir précisément ce qu’ils vont devoir y do.
“At 4 am, we heard the first shots from the Grad rocket launchers. It was such a deluge of fire that we knew it was serious,” he told BFMTV.
“We had been living with the idea that NATO was threatening Russia for a year. So at the time, I thought we were going to fight NATO troops.”
“I denounced the lie of the Russian government”
His first target was the city of Kherson: first the bridge, then the airport. “Each time, we only knew about the targets at the last moment. The first two weeks, we didn’t even have sleeping bags, we slept on the floor,” says the former soldier.
No drinking water, no food: After several days of occupation, members of the Russian military began stealing whatever they could find, he says. “I saw that many did not resist the temptation to steal notebooks, smartphones. Many did so because their salary did not allow them to buy them. Everyone helped each other in the shops”, explains Pavel Filatyev.
“I said no to war,” says who presents himself more as a whistleblower than a deserter, stating “that there were no neo-Nazis in front of us. I denounced the lie of the Russian government.”
His revelations now make him a target for the Kremlin. Pavel Filatyev was forced to flee Russia. To our colleagues from guardianHe says that he hopes that the war will end thanks to great popular mobilizations like those of the time of the Vitenam war.
Source: BFM TV
