Russia said on Thursday it had opened a criminal investigation into allegations by a Russian soldier that he was beaten and received death threats while being held as a prisoner of war in Ukraine.
Russia's Investigative Committee said the man, identified only by the initial E, was captured after a battle on March 2 in which he was seriously wounded. The soldier, a private, was returned to Russia after a prisoner swap on April 1, it said.
During that time, the Committee said he was repeatedly interrogated by both military personnel and people in civilian clothes with masks on their heads and beaten on the head repeatedly with fists, a brick and a pistol.
