Their release in exchange for being sent to the front shocked the world. Russian fugitives engaged in the war in Ukraine as part of the Russian army in exchange for a future amnesty are "expiating their crime with blood", Vladimir Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday, a strategy criticised by NGOs but which the Kremlin assumes.
"People convicted, including those for serious crimes, atone for their crime with blood on the battlefield," Peskov told reporters. "They atone with blood (being) in assault units, under bullets, under shells," he said.
Vladimir Putin's spokesman was responding to a question about Vladislav Kaniouss, a man sentenced to 17 years in prison for the sordid murder of his ex-girlfriend, who according to some Russian media outlets was released after fighting on the Ukrainian front.
The case of Vladislav Kaniouss had caused a stir among women's organizations in the country. Tens of thousands of convicted criminals, some of whom have been convicted of murder or rape, have been recruited since last year in prison to come and fight for several months in Ukraine in exchange for an amnesty.
100,000 fighters recruited from prison
This strategy was put in place in parallel with the mobilization of several hundred thousand reservists, i.e. civilians, in the fall of 2022. According to Olga Romanova, an exiled former journalist who campaigns for the rights of prisoners and opposition activists in Russia, Moscow has recruited a total of 100,000 fighters in prison. The Kremlin, for its part, has never given an official figure.
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This was notably the case for some Wagner fighters, who were poached directly from their cells or in the courtyard of their prison by the former leader of the paramilitary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, who died in August in the mid-air explosion of his plane two months after an abortive rebellion.
But this strategy can prove dangerous for society when these fugitives from justice return from the front, NGOs have already warned. In recent months, the local Russian press has reported several cases of released prisoners who have committed serious crimes, including murder or rape, after leaving the army after being granted amnesty.