How women in the Russian army are being forced into sex slavery in Ukraine

The Russia-Ukraine war is tough. Countless people have died, and even more have been left homeless. The relentless fighting has reduced towns to rubble and families have been ripped apart. Now, as the war enters the 400th day, there are new claims of Russian women soldiers being passed around by their high-ranking officials.

The alleged exploitation of women in the Russian troops has come to light after independent news outlet Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty published an interview with a service member who said male officers force women into sex slavery — and those who refuse face horrible mistreatment.

Here’s what we know.

Women used as sex slaves

According to the report published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, a woman, identified as Margarita, said that women, who joined the Russian armed forces to fight the Ukraine war, were being forced to become field wives — cooking, cleaning, and pleasuring the male officers.

She added that those who refused would be subject to abuse and punishment. Speaking of her time on the frontline, she told the news outlet, “When we went there, no one, of course, knew what was going on. And when we understood, there was no turning back.”

A former soldier — she had left the force in 2011 — she recounts that after resuming service, a colonel singled her out and made repeated sexual advances towards her. However, when she refused, the high-ranking official ordered his subordinates to make life tough for her.

Also read: Will the Russia-Ukraine war end in 2023?

She said, “For a month I just lived outside. When others spent the night in tents and houses, I slept on the ground, near the road, in a small forest… They wanted to break me so that I would agree to sleep with the colonel.”

Highlighting other instances of abuse and exploitation, Magarita spoke of another woman who was left permanently disable after an officer shot her while he was drunk. She said she had seen the woman being beaten by the officer with the butt of his rifle multiple times before.

Another horrifying instance was when a woman was ‘passed around’ between officers and kept away from the platoon. She said that mostly the girls had made peace with it. “They decided that it’s better to live in paradise in this war — fed and with cigarettes,” Magarita was quoted as saying.

The extent of the abuse was horrifying and didn’t limit itself to only sex. Magarita said that she saw many troops being attacked by their seniors or being verbally abused by them. One common practice, she noticed was locking troops who didn’t want to fight on the frontline in cold basements filled with rats — and leaving them there naked.

If that method failed, she said commanders also had a more “original” way to get their subordinates to comply with orders. “They would force (conscripts) to dig their own graves. They would dig a hole and then be forced to lie in it,” Margarita recounted.

“And other guys, at gunpoint, would sprinkle dirt all over them. Even their heads would not be sticking out. Then the platoon leader or company commander would walk off and shoot at those holes one by one.”

Magarita has since enduring the abuse has left the service again and is now in rehabilitation at home. For the past two months since returning home, she visits a psychologist. She is still coping with the trauma, with her telling the news outlet, “Even when I’m not alone and I’m doing something, I still see before my eyes all that horror.”

Using sexual abuse as a weapon

Russian troops fighting the war against Ukraine have, in the past, also been accused of sexual assault and using rape as a tool against Ukrainians.

A United Nations investigation has revealed several instances of sexual violence being perpetrated across all genders, with the victims’ ages ranging from four to 82 years.

Also read: Russia giving soldiers Viagra to rape Ukrainians, claims UN envoy

Apart from this, Ukraine’s ombudsman for human rights reported that not only did Russian forces hold dozens of Ukrainian girls and women as sexual slaves, the soldiers also said they hoped that as a result their captives would recoil from sex in the future and thus not bear Ukrainian children.

Natalia Karbowska, a Ukrainian civil-society activist, told the UN Security Council last June, “Sexual violence in this war is the most hidden crime.”

And there’s a reason to the silence around these heinous crimes. Often, the victims of these crimes pass away in the war. In other instance, they flee the nation and are not in contact with Ukrainian authorities. Others feel ashamed, clinging to the belief that they could somehow have prevented what befell them.

As the Los Angeles Times in a report wrote, “Rape as a weapon is as old as war itself.” Experts agree with this, saying that the objective is not sexual gratification but to humiliate and degrade the defenders; to shatter families and instil a sense of hopelessness and despair.

It seems unlikely that any of the perpetrators of these crimes will stand trial and more likely will escape any punishment, but for women like Magarita and others the trauma will continue, plaguing their lives and making it very hard to forget.

With inputs from agencies

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