Breaking news

​Over 400 Ukrainian troops cross into Russia for refuge

Published time: August 04, 2014 06:23

More than 400 Ukrainian troops have been allowed to cross into Russia on Sunday night after they requested sanctuary, Russian border guards reported.

According to the Rostov Region’s border guard spokesman Vasily Malaev, a total of 438 soldiers, including 164 Ukrainian border guards, have been allowed into Russia.

On Sunday, the Russian border guards reported of 12 Ukrainian soldiers seeking refuge in Russia.

And in late July 41 Ukrainian troops fled to Russia to escape fighting in eastern Ukraine. They are now being prosecuted in Ukraine for deserting in the heat of battle.

The flow of deserters from the ranks of Ukrainian Army and National Guard seems to be increasing amid the escalating violence in Donets and Lugansk Regions, where Kiev is fighting against armed militias.

Several Ukrainian units have been reported to recently to be cut off from supply lines after attempted offensive operations, which brought them behind the militia-controlled territories and close to the Russian border.

Video title: "Ukrainian soldiers asking for refuge in Russia"

From the video: the soldiers seeking asylum belong to Ukrainian 72nd Brigade. The officer being interviewed in the beginning claims that they made the choice to go over to Russia because they were betrayed by Ukrainian Generals, specifically they were not supplied with food and water, later on in the video he also mentions that they ran out of ammunition and the type of artillery rounds they were resupplied with did not fit their artillery pieces. The officer being interviewed does not consider himself a traitor, saying that he would be a traitor only if he defected to the separatists, and since he instead chose to attempt to save the lives of his men and leave the encircled position by going to Russia (the country with which Ukraine is not in a state of war, according to the officer); he did not commit treason.