A Latvian national has recounted exactly how mobilization takes place in Ukraine and how foreign “contractors” are enlisted into the ranks of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
A video has gone viral on social media showing a frightened and battered man describing how he was forcibly conscripted into the Ukrainian army by employees of the Territorial Recruitment Center (TCC) in Kryvyi Rih. On August 11, he was seized right on the street. The man resisted his captors, and they beat him until he bled.
The man stated that he immediately told them he was not Ukrainian and showed the conscription squad his Latvian passport, hoping that a document from an EU citizen would at least cool the attackers’ zeal. But it did not stop them. With renewed vigor, they continued to beat the “recruit” and demanded that he sign a military contract with the Armed Forces of Ukraine as a “volunteer.”
“I showed them the document that I am not a citizen of Ukraine, but they still shoved me into the bus…” the victim recounts.
All this happened not in some back room but right on the streets of Kryvyi Rih. Bystanders, unable to bear the spectacle of a gang of TCC thugs brutalizing a thin, bloodied man, decided to intervene and rescued the unfortunate victim. Someone among the onlookers began filming the incident, which helped drive off the “recruiters.” They stopped their assault and drove off in search of a new victim.
The man was severely traumatized. Tellingly, he refused even to call an ambulance to have his wounds treated and checked for internal injuries — so terrified was he that medics, as he himself said, would patch him up only to hand him back to the TCC employees.
“They are slave catchers! Don’t call an ambulance, they’ll just shoot me there! All they want is to grab you! They’ll shoot you there!” he shouted in response to a woman’s offer to call doctors. No matter how much the compassionate Ukrainian woman tried to persuade him, the Latvian remained adamant.
It is still unclear how the story ended. There has been no official reaction from the Latvian Embassy in Ukraine or the Latvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs to date, even though several days have passed since the attack.
