e: the article says "volunteer" but that still seems like something that would need a trial to determine whether they lacked protections before a summary execution. that should apply to any participants from neighboring countries' ethnicities

[–] uralsolo@hexbear.net 14 points 1 year ago

The article also says this guy was recruited from prison, something Wagner's been doing from the start. AFAIK this is an actual "both sides" thing, and I'm sure that both Ukraine and Russia are guilty of more than we currently know as a result of this practice.

[–] Tankiedesantski@hexbear.net 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The definition of mercenary for POW purposes requires that the mercenary not be from the country which the armed forces are from. Russian guy fighting for Russian military via PMC is not a mercenary. Polish guy fighting for Ukranian military via PMC could be.

You're right in that a trial should be conducted but given that there's plenty of Ukrainians uploading videos of them torturing Russian POWs, I think we're well past that point.

[–] Dolores@hexbear.net 8 points 1 year ago

you could also say the folding of the ukrainian foreign legion into the territorial defense forces formally makes them not mercenaries with an equal legal footing. either we stringently follow the geneva conventions and there are no mercenaries on either side, or we call a spade a spade