During fighting near Vovchansk in Kharkiv Oblast, soldiers from Ukraine's 120th Separate Brigade of the Territorial Defense Forces have captured a foreign mercenary.

He turned out to be 25-year-old Iraqi citizen Alimari Kamal Nabil Khalaf, who spoke of blackmail, beatings, and inhumane conditions within the Russian army.

Ukrainian soldiers are usually suspicious when hearing information like that, as such stories are common among captured Russian soldiers.

“20 years in prison or the front line”: How the Iraqi citizen was lured into fighting

Alimari Kamal Nabil Khalaf, a native of Kirkuk, served in the 82nd Motorized Rifle Regiment of Russia’s 69th Motorized Rifle Division.

He had arrived in Russia on a tourist visa and was working in a restaurant when police detained him for lacking a work permit.

“He was given a choice: 20 years in prison or a contract with the Russian Defense Ministry,” Ukraine's brigade reported.

The prisoner admitted he agreed to the deal to avoid prison but later “realized it was hell.”

“We were beaten and humiliated”: Life of foreigners in the Russian army

“I chose the contract, but then I understood it was hell. We were beaten, humiliated, treated like animals,” said Alimari.

According to him, during “training,” he was surrounded by other foreigners from Kenya and Ghana, who were also beaten and forced to perform dangerous missions without any preparation.

He confessed that Russia had “destroyed his life” and thanked Ukrainian soldiers for their humane treatment. 

“I thank the Ukrainian soldiers for sparing my life and treating me like a human being," added Alimari. 

The cynicism of “contracts”: Migrants sent to die

The 120th Brigade emphasized that this is the true face of Russian “contracts” with their blackmail, coercion, and death.

“Behind the loud talk of ‘foreign volunteers’ lies the cynical exploitation of migrants, sent to die, and then erased as if they never existed,” the Ukrainian soldiers concluded.

On 17 October, a therapeutic garden opened at Kyiv's VDNKh, a major exhibition and recreation complex, to support emotional recovery for veterans, military personnel and anyone else who needs it, according to the Ministry of Health.

The garden includes zones for:

• therapeutic gardening
• adaptive sports activities
• somatic practices
• a children's playground
• informal gathering areas
• group meeting spaces

Plants were selected based on their impact on emotional state, interacting with visitors through all five senses to help reduce emotional tension, the ministry reported. Seasonal flowering ensures the garden remains functional year-round.

The space aims to support the physical, psychological and social health of military personnel, veterans and others who need it through contact with nature and movement.

First Lady Olena Zelenska, who initiated the project, said at the opening that places offering safety, calm and harmony are particularly lacking for those who have experienced the pain of war.

"This is the therapeutic effect of nature and interaction with it, already proven by many scientific studies," she said, expressing hope that similar spaces will multiply across Ukraine.

Officials view it as a step toward building modern post-rehabilitation infrastructure, with similar gardens potentially appearing at medical facilities and public spaces nationwide.

Minister of Health Viktor Liashko emphasized that psychological support for those who experienced war trauma is a shared societal task.

"We need to create conditions that help a person recover — physically, psychologically and emotionally," he said.

All infrastructure follows barrier-free access principles, with hard non-slip surfaces, raised flower beds, benches with armrests, Braille navigation, contrast signs and a tactile map.

The space's development involved psychologists, psychotherapists, art therapists, hospital workers, volunteers and landscape architects from Ukraine, Europe and Great Britain, who consulted with veterans, military personnel, rehabilitation patients, elderly people and medical institution representatives.

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Ukraine opens first rehab center for torture survivors after Russian captivity

Russian forces likely executed another Ukrainian prisoner of war (POW), Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said on July 1, referring to a recent video that appears to show the captive tied to a motorcycle and dragged along a road.

The alleged execution adds to growing evidence that Russian forces are systematically violating the Geneva Conventions by killing Ukrainian captives.

"A video is circulating on social media showing a man being tied to a motorcycle and dragged along the road," Lubinets said in a statement.

"It is a clear act of demonstrative cruelty and yet another war crime by the Russian Federation."

Lubinets said he has sent official letters regarding the suspected war crime to the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

"Russia is acting as a terrorist state. And it must be held fairly accountable for every crime," he added.

Ukraine's military intelligence agency (HUR) alone reported in May that it had documented more than 150 cases of Ukrainian soldiers being executed after surrendering to Russian forces. Officials noted that these were only the confirmed incidents, and the real number is likely higher.

HUR and other agencies say such executions are not isolated but part of a broader, deliberate policy directed by Russia's military leadership. Multiple intelligence reports suggest that Russian soldiers have received explicit orders to kill prisoners of war.

The United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine confirmed in March growing numbers of incidents in which Russian forces killed or maimed surrendering Ukrainian troops.

The commission cited testimony from Russian deserters who said they were instructed not to take prisoners but to shoot them on sight.

Earlier this year, the U.N. Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine reported a sharp increase in POW executions, documenting 79 killings across 24 incidents since August 2024. In many cases, the victims were unarmed or wounded, and some were killed in groups.

Ukraine’s new interceptor UAVs are starting to knock Russia’s long-range Shahed drones out of the sky

Russia’s Shahed drone swarms are pummeling Ukraine on a nightly basis, inflicting ever more death and destruction in cities that had managed to carve out some sense of normalcy amid wartime. Civilian alarm has grown. With traditional air defense stockpiles running low, the government is banking on newly created

The Kyiv IndependentKollen Post

A Russian military court has convicted 184 Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) captured in Kursk Oblast of acts of terrorism, Mediazona reported on June 25.

Ukraine first launched a surprise offensive into Russia's Kursk Oblast in August 2024. Ukrainian officials have said the incursion forced Russia to move resources away from its offensives in Eastern Ukraine.

Russia's military prosecutors office convicts Ukrainian POWs captured in Kursk Oblast on a regular basis, independent Russian outlet Mediazona reported.

The POWs captured in Kursk were charged with carrying out a grave terrorist act by a group of individuals, as outlined by the Russian Criminal Code.

Junior Lieutenant Yevhen Hoch was convicted of allegedly carrying out an act of terrorism by taking part in Ukraine's Kursk Oblast incursion.

Russia has waged its war against Ukraine since 2014 and initiated a full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Russian authorities accused Hoch of interfering with civilian evacuations for three weeks amid Ukraine's Kursk offensive and for "intimidating them by openly carrying and using combat weapons."

Russia regularly convicts people of politically motivated charges in an effort to silence opposition to its war against Ukraine.

The Russian 2nd Western District Military Court has carried out the sentences against the 184 Ukrainian POWs since the beginning of the year.

Moscow has gone after journalists in Ukraine's Russian-occupied territories. Ukrainian Journalist Viktoriia Roshchyna disappeared in August 2023 and died after being tortured in Russian captivity. Roschyna's body was returned to Ukraine in February with missing organs.

Putin insists the Russian economy is fine, but Kremlin officials say otherwise

In a rare public sign that all is not well in Russia, two high-ranking Moscow officials last week issued separate warnings about the state of the country’s economy. Russian Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina and Economy Minister Maxim Reshetnikov both highlighted that amid the Kremlin’s full-scale war against Ukraine, the tools Moscow once relied on to maintain wartime growth are nearly exhausted. Almost immediately, Russian President Vladimir Putin on June 20 dismissed the concerns, clai

The Kyiv IndependentTim Zadorozhnyy

Ukrainian actor Yuriy Felipenko, who worked with Kyiv Independent reporters, was killed at the frontline, his wife Kateryna Motrych wrote on social media on June 15.

Felipenko was well known for his role in the 2024 television series “A Promise to God” before joining the Achilles Strike Drone Battalion, then part of Ukraine’s 92nd Assault Brigade, in April 2024.

Having since been upgraded to a separate regiment and one of the founding units of the Line of Drones initiative, Achilles is one of the most effective drone units in the country.

“Yura was killed. Yura was, without exaggeration, my world, my soul, my light. It is impossible to convey this loss. I feel like I have been destroyed,” Motrych wrote on her Instagram page, accompanied by a photo of Felipenko.

Felipenko's drone team was featured in a report by the Kyiv Independent on Ukraine's use of first-person view (FPV) drones against Russian infantry assaults in December 2024 as they defended the area around Kupiansk in Kharkiv Oblast.

Details of Felipenko’s funeral will be announced later, Motrych said.

Russia has killed numerous actors, artists, and writers since the start of the full-scale invasion. Many have fallen on the battlefield while others were killed during attacks on civilian areas.

Ukrainian opera tenor and volunteer killed in Sumy Oblast

Vladyslav Horai, a renowned tenor and soloist of the Odesa National Opera, was killed in Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy Oblast while on a volunteer mission, the opera house reported on June 8.

The Kyiv IndependentOlena Goncharova