Three Ukrainian soldiers, who were captured by the enemy during the clash at Svitlodarsk bulge, have been killed in captivity, the coordinator of the StopTerror project Semen Kabakayev wrote on 23 December.
"A tragic loss at the Svitlodarsk bulge. Three our guys are dead," he wrote on Facebook referring to videos and photos posted by separatists.
He said two Ukrainian soldiers were wounded in combat in the vicinity of Svitlodarsk and captured by "either local militants or Russian mercenaries". The militants sent the footage of the captured soldiers to ATO command with an offer of exchange of prisoners.
For some reason, the exchange failed.
"The captured were moved to Debaltsevo, abused and tortured and, finally, killed. They have immediately sent the brutal photos of torture and dead bodies as a confirmation," Kabakayev wrote.
"The third one was believed to be missing in action. We got in touch with the opposite side, and it turned out that, according to them, he was in captivity, but we did not find confirmation. A few hours ago, they handed his dead body over to us with a few bullets in the head."
Separatist and Russian web resources posted these photos and videos, Kabakayev wrote.
ATO HQ on 18 December officially confirmed the capture of one Ukrainian serviceman at Svitlodarsk bulge.