Ukrainians offer tea, food to Russian soldiers

An image has emerged of Ukrainians offering a cup of tea to a man alleged to be a Russian soldier.

TheCornet sighted a tweet by a user @lapatina_ showing a soldier wearing a green headwarmer and staring into a phone held by a woman.

Kyiv Independent reports that Ukrainian civilians are providing captured Russians with tea and food, and are letting them call their mothers via video chat.

Also, the Ukrainian defence ministry said it had taken a decision “to hand over captured Russian troops to their mothers if they come to collect them in Ukraine, in Kyiv.”

This comes after Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk asked for the International Red Cross to help repatriate the dead bodies of Russian soldiers.

Last week she said: ‘There are thousands of invaders’ bodies. This is a humanitarian need.

‘We ask for the bodies of the invaders to leave Ukrainian territory and go to Russia.

‘We call upon Russians again to make it so that there are fewer bodies of your sons, of your men, otherwise there will be thousands of them. I say it again, victory will be ours.’

Last week a platoon of Russian soldiers who surrendered claimed they weren’t aware they had been sent out to kill, according to the Ukrainian military.

In a statement released on Thursday, the platoon’s commander is said to have claimed he only learned of the invasion the day before and believed they were going to return home.

A quote attributed to the commander, named as Konstantin Buynichev, said: ‘Nobody thought that we were going to kill. We were not going to fight – we were collecting information.’

The claims were reiterated by Ukraine’s ambassador to the US, Oksana Markarova, at a press conference in Washington, DC on Thursday.

A Russian soldier surrendered. Ukrainians gave him tea, food, and let him call his mother on video. I want to cry from how much I love my country. pic.twitter.com/ZiERQsyBbo

— Anastasiia Lapatina (@lapatina_) March 2, 2022