Away from it all - the tragic story of a prisoner of war

We met the young soldier, who was released from Russian captivity a little more than half a year ago, and who is just 30 years old – let’s call him Andriy – in front of a fast-food restaurant in the hinterland of the front line, in Uzhhorod.

It was early Sunday afternoon, and although we were in the heart of the city, the wide, two-lane street welcomed the visitors with surprising silence. To our greatest surprise, Andriy also greeted us in Hungarian. With a half-smile on his face, looking for refuge and protection, he stood behind his companion after we introduced ourselves. He did not even want to speak Ukrainian to anyone. When we asked the very thin, worn faced young man, he answered quietly, only with a few words at a time. Yet, when we sat down together at a larger table to eat one of the offered menus of the fast-food restaurant, he seemed relaxed. Andriy thanked me in Hungarian when I filled his drink and took his cutlery from me.  But he didn’t want to talk. In fact, it was not necessary. All of us understood all his nods. The thin face, the slightly bent upper body, the posture seeking the protection of a good friend, the eyes that avoided glances and one of the eyeballs that was still bloodshot revealed everything about the agony of his three months as a prisoner of war, the suffering and the mind affliction from post-traumatic stress, which – when he is awake or during his sleep when dreaming, by reliving the tortures of captivity over and over again, with the multitude of memories that intrude – occupies every second of his time.

In fact, Andriy has not spoken more than a few words since his release. Due to the torture, he endured in captivity, he was silent for months. We know what happened to him from the volunteer who visited him in the hospital, who came to see him every day, and as it turned out for us, this story could only be put together from dropped words and from the perspective of almost six months.

Hovering between life and death, Andriy and two other fellow prisoners of war were found in a field on a frosty October day. Their bare upper bodies were emaciated, their heads were covered with sacks and there were no shoes on their feet. Andriy still remembered how his two other fellow soldiers had dragged him by the shoulders to get him onto the truck in the prisoners of war camp that had taken them to nowhere… Andriy was sure that he was about to be shot. He lost consciousness from weakness. When they were taken off the truck, he was surrounded by silence. He had no strength. No sound came out of his throat. He knew that he was on Ukrainian soil, his memory flashed back to the Russian soldiers who had brought him here. It is as if they were left alive to demonstrate that those who were not killed would not be able to live a decent life. Andriy hovered between life and death. It didn’t really bother him that during his three months of captivity he had become something like a still-breathing skeleton.  After all, he could count his ribs separately and experience the stinging, painful arches of his pelvic bones when lying hard. But the tortures he endured every day, which in fact turned into aimless, unreasoning offenses on the part of his captors, left a lifelong physical and mental marks on every inch of his body and on every thought of him. Andriy was found completely toothless in the field where he had been dumped in the middle of nowhere. His torturers pulled out his teeth one by one, beat him unconscious several times, shot one of his fellow prisoners dead in front of his eyes, starved him, and made him suffer from thirst and daily, horrible physical tortures. These are traumatic experiences that are horrible to say, and which can really blow the minds of young men who have just started their lives.

Andriy was also shocked that, although two of his companions supported him onto the truck, one of them was no longer alive when he was found. There, on that October day, he also had to face the trauma of seeing the lifeless, frozen body of his saviour lying next to him when they came for them.

Andriy has been recovering since October. At first the wounds on his body started to heal, he was slowly able to use his limbs, ha was walking again, his teeth are started to be reimplanted, he was able to eat properly. But the pain associated with the dental implantation is bringing back memories of torture, and his vision is still not clear in his bloodshot eye. There, too, he is waiting for an operation, because without intervention he can expect no better condition than this. He is now being treated at the fourth hospital. It’s almost his home. Since his original residence was in the war zone, he sees no chance of going home soon. He waits for time to pass and let his pleading words to his captors, which occasionally return to his mind, to kill him rather than torture him any longer, fade away as well. But his sensitive, young soul is still waiting for help.

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