A UK soldier, Aiden Aslin, revealed the treatment Western soldiers received in Russian prisons after being captured in Ukraine by President Vladimir Putin’s troops. Speaking to Britain’s Sun on Sunday, the 28-year-old said that his Russian captor told him death could either be “quick or beautiful”. The former prisoner of war also said they were treated “worse than a dog”. 

Aslin, who was in captivity for five months, revealed that he was beaten, forced to sing the Russian national anthem, and even stabbed at the hands of his captors. 

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The British national was captured after Russia’s siege on Mariupol and the fall of the Azov Sea port city. He was then taken to the separatist Donetsk region, where Aslin claimed he was kept in a 4ft by 6ft cell, infested with lice and cockroaches. 

“The soldier asked in Russian, ‘where are you from?’ I told him I was from Great Britain and he punched me in the face”, he said, describing how the soldiers quickly figured out he was not Ukrainian after the capture. 

“They separated me from the others and began interviewing me in the back of an armoured vehicle. I went to my commander and said, ‘look, I’m going to be taken, they’re probably going to kill me, I need you to tell my family when you get out, if you get out, that I love them”, Aslin added. 

The British prisoner of war detailed that he was beaten repeatedly during interrogation and his captor threatened to cut his ear off. 

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“He said, ‘did you see what I did to you?’ He pointed to my back. He showed me his knife and I realized he’d stabbed me”, Aslin said of an encounter. When the British national wanted a “quick” death, the Russian captor insisted he would give the prisoner a “beautiful” one instead. 

Aslin was among the foreign fighters who volunteered for the Ukraine war, and among thousands who were captured. His release was part of the deal brokered between former Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich and Saudi Arabian officials. Ten Western nationals were sent home in the prisoner exchange.