Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
POLICE HAVE APPREHENDED an army deserter who hid in a forest in eastern Russia for more than a decade and kept his whereabouts secret from even his family, regional authorities said today.
The 30-year-old man, whose identity was not made public, was drafted into the military in 2003 and was stationed in the remote Kamchatka peninsula for one year before fleeing the army’s ranks, police said.
“He lived in Kamchatka all this time, mainly hiding in the forest,” the regional branch of the interior ministry said in a statement. “He got by with odd jobs and did not attempt to get in touch with his family.”
The search for the deserter, who hails from the southern Russian city of Taganrog, was stopped when his family erroneously identified a dead body as that of their missing relative a few months after his disappearance, the statement said.
TASS news agency reported that the deserter’s family had even buried that body thinking it belonged to their missing loved one.
The soldier would have deserted because of “family problems”, TASS quoted regional authorities as saying.
The deserter reportedly had built himself a home out of old construction materials on the outskirts of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, and made a living by working on a private pig farm and collecting scrap, among other odd jobs.
Soldiers found guilty of desertion can face up to seven years in prison under Russian law. In 2003, mandatory military service lasted two years, a duration which has since been reduced to a year.
Valentina Melnikova, the head of Russia’s Committee of Soldiers’ Mothers, told AFP she doubted the soldier would receive prison time for his offence.
“There were lots of deserters in those days in the Far East. We’ve had cases when some would hide in a basement for years, but they would go through a psychiatric examination and would be set free,” she said.
The Chief Military Prosecutor’s office did not reply to a request for comment.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Russian service men? With the German flag on their sleeve? Journal, is this the best you can do?
Probably just went for the usual stock photo and didn’t look properly.. Nothing new
They are both Russian and German soldiers Mr. Smarty Pants..
They could belong to the amnesia brigade who had faulty GPS’s….
Well to be fair, those look like tiny little coffins, especially as you can see the crosses on them.and it looks like Russian and UN troops both paying respects to some tragedy or other.
Well spotted.
Correction, the German soldiers aren’t UN troops, they are from the medical corps, slight difference in colour of the headgear, UN troops wear a lighter blue
Yep, the picture title suppose to say “Russian and German serviceman” . This is a picture is from ceremony in Kirovsk on 20 of August 2015. The coffins are with remains of Soviet soldiers who died in fighting near Leningrad (St. Petersburg) in 1941-1944. There was a joint operation by Germans and Russians to excavate the remains of the fallen soldiers during The Battle of Leningrad.
The soldiers in “greener” uniforms are Russians. So one Russian, one German…..
The Russian army is a tough place to be.Bullying is commonplace and hundreds kill themselves and are murdered annually.A lot gets covered up.This lad felt better off living in the wilds of Siberia that being in the army.That says it all.
@Hypernova. Yep, things like this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMULE1_qZEE were quite common and it is not the worst compare to other cases. In fairness to say things have improved a bit now.
Someone must stand in the Dunces corner for that.
I’d say the photo is from a joint ww2 war graves reburial…note the large number of coffins.Stalin had all the German war graves bulldozed after the war so many of the locations were lost.
He must have really hated his job considering the existence he endured for the last ten years!
Brutality is rife in the Russian armed forces.
Not for the faint hearted.
Probably got fed up being brutalised, for what ? Russian army is more brutal then most. Should get a medal for pacifism.
I wonder how they knew it was him. Since the Russian army and his family thought he was dead and noone was after him.
How did he get caught ?
He reeked of vodka..
The article doesn’t say but that’s what I’d like to know. I wonder did he hand himself in after all these years.
Goose stepping to the pig farm.
Feel sorry for this guy as the are very authoritarian. I was talking to this Russian man was work for a public body and said had a disagreement with boss he was separated from newly engaged wife and sent to Siberia for army service for 10 years! When he came back wife remarried and had a family.
have your say