Russian television broadcast images on Wednesday, November 27, of a journalist interrogating a British man captured while fighting for Ukraine in the Kursk region, the scene of an incursion by kyiv.
Handcuffed, with his head shaved and dressed in a prison uniform, James Anderson is interrogated in English by a war correspondent from the Rossiya 1 channel, dressed in camouflage uniform, who asks him if he is a “Nazi.”
Russia has opened criminal proceedings against the 22-year-old, accusing him of having carried out a “terrorist attack”, which carries a sentence of up to 20 years in prison, and of having acted as a mercenary in combat, which places him at risk of up to 15 years in prison.
Russia does not treat foreigners captured fighting for Ukraine as prisoners of war, but as mercenaries.
“Are you a Nazi?”
James Anderson, originally from Banbury, England, appeared calm during the interview, showing the journalist his tattoos and saying that he did not kill civilians while fighting for Ukraine. Russian television said he was fighting for a “neo-Nazi battalion” made up of volunteers.
“Are you a Nazi?” asked the journalist. To which James Anderson responded “no.”
His fingernails were black with dirt, suggesting he was being held in unsanitary conditions. James Anderson said he fought with a Dane and a British man in the Kursk region. It is not known if they were also taken prisoner.
In comments dubbed into Russian, James Anderson allegedly said he began fighting in the Kursk region on November 15. He was jailed on November 23. Russia’s Investigative Committee said on Tuesday that he was suspected of carrying out “criminal actions against the peaceful population.”
Last month, Russia sentenced a 72-year-old American citizen to nearly seven years in prison on charges of fighting as a mercenary alongside Ukraine. Stephen Hubbard had been detained for more than two years and was found guilty after a closed-door trial.
Source: BFM TV
