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A leading expert in Russia’s prison system, Olga Romanova, says the Kremlin’s latest recruitment tactic in the war on Ukraine is something out of her “worst nightmares.”
Yevgeny Prigozhin—the head of Vladimir Putin’s shadowy private army, Wagner Group—has been taking trips to Russian prison camps in order to enlist convicted criminals to fight in Ukraine, according to accounts from military analysts and videos that have emerged on Telegram from Russian prisons.
And according to Romanova, who has dedicated the past 15 years of her life to monitoring Russia’s prison population as the head of the organization Russia Behind Bars, the recruitment campaign is targeting some of Russia’s “worst criminals.”