The SSU building at 62 Shchorsa Street was taken over in early May 2014. The 'militiamen’ used it as their base. Hundreds of prisoners were held detained at the buildings at the same time, and many of them are still in those basements.

According to eyewitnesses, during early stages of the conflict, the SSU building was under control of very different, most 'random’ people. Many of these people had no established social position before the war. This chaos reflected on the conditions of prisoners too.

For instance, a fighter of Donbas battalion Oleksiy Antypov (his photo below is a screenshot from the pro-separatist film ‘66 captured hitmen’) who was captured while exiting the Ilovaysk kettle and spent a long time at Donetsk SSU, refers to the opinion of the 'LPR' soldiers who were in charge of the base:

“… We were taken to Ilovaysk for repair work. There, we faced completely different treatment. There were people who had fought against us, shot at us and was shot by us. No one put any physical or psychological pressure on us. We earned respect in combat… At the line-up, we put our hands behind our backs as usually. They said, 'Guys, we don't want to see that anymore. You were guarded by crooked scumbags, we are not going to push you around”

The 'militiamen’ detained hundreds of Ukrainian military prisoners, both from the armed forces and volunteer battalions, at the seized SSU building. They treated the volunteers much harsher than conscripts. There  were even reports that volunteers were immediately executed. Reasons for execution could be simply wearing an American uniform, which was purchased privately rather than issued by the army.

They also took locals 'to the basement’ for drinking alcohol, violating curfew, or on suspicion of adjustment of fire.

There were two alcoholics who violated curfew. They were accused of adjusting fire and being a guide. Though they were so soaked with alcohol, that there was no sign of intellect. I don’t know how you can accuse someone like that of adjusting fire.

Andriy Nalyvayko, former Donetsk SSU prisoner.

One of the reasons for detaining civilians was the need in work force for cleaning, helping in the cafeteria, constructing fortifications, digging trenches, in particular at the frontline, working at the mortuary etc. For these purposes, they could arrest someone in violation of a curfew or holding a beer bottle, which was punishable by detention and community service for 5 to 15 days.

The main claim against the militarymen, even those coming from Eastern Ukraine was “Why did you come to our land?”.

They were particularly aggressive towards locals who tried to leave Donbas; they were considered traitors. Some former prisoners stated that these people were treated with particular cruelty.

Three boys were caught leaving Chervonosilsk. Two of them were severely beaten and thrown into the basement. They told us about the third guy who had been executed (they heard him getting shot)... They consider people from Luhansk and Donetsk to be traitors of motherland. They are treated in a more cruel manner.

The cells and the archive

The SSU building is П-shaped. Several rooms in the basement were assigned as cells for prisoners. In different times, different categories of prisoners were held there - sometimes, civilians were detained together with the military, and women were detained together with men. According to a former prisoner, there were even women with children in one of the cells. There was no strict order, at least during the first two years.

Many cells in the basement were overcrowded. For instance, up to nine persons were put in a 1x2m cell, and it was difficult to even sit there. There was no ventilation in the cells. Moreover, the prisoners were smoking, and the room was filled with smoke.

First cell is hell because it was one meter up and half a meter down, it was on a slant. There were six people in the cell. There was absolutely no air, no vent whatsoever. There was a lot of sand flies, thousands of sand flies. There was a smell of blood, and the blood was both dry and fresh. Again, they gave out cartons for people to smoke. They mixed the air with tobacco, with the smoke.

… When another two-three people came, it was incredibly difficult to stay in that cell. They decided to switch things around, for instance, transfer people to other cells. There was a bigger cell right next to us. There used to be a shooting range for practice there, it was a big room. There were 30 persons in the room at that time, which was the acceptable norm, but not the limit, as it turned out. There were mattresses. There were elderly men, one woman… There were cupboards for those who wanted to use the toilet - one could do it either behind the cupboards, or into the bottle, or into the bucket since it was impossible to wait any longer.

The former archive was located one floor up. It was filled with metal racks, each with six levels. That was where prisoners were sleeping. The distance between shelves was very small, less that half a meter, and people basically had their noses against the top shelf. They did not give any bed clothing. The archive could simultaneously hold up to 200 persons, in particular women.

Donbas battalion fighter Andriy Skachkov (on the photo) told Fakty newspaper about conditions of detention at the archive:

One time, the OSCE observers came to the cell. However, we didn’t know who they were. They didn’t ask us any questions, looked around and left. The only thing I remember is that one of them asked surprised, ‘Where is the bed clothing?’ Not everyone could even get a place on the shelf, and some people were sleeping on the floor, on the doors that had been taken down, putting their clothes under the head. What bed clothing can one be talking about?! However, after the observers’ visit the meals improved, they even gave us vitamins.

On the first floor, on the same level as the archive, were interrogation offices that saw constant torture. The majority of prisoners heard screams and moans coming from there.

Conditions of detention

The schedule and quality of meals, according to the eyewitnesses, changed constantly. However, in general, the food was unsatisfactory. Oleksiy Antypov remembers the food at the SSU with disgust:

The food was disgusting. Twice a day were received one and a half dipper of barley or chopped grains, and one tenth of a bread loaf. We drank water from the tap. In a month, we started receiving small packages from families and volunteers. About 70-80 percent of those did not reach us. We were at the SSU building from 31 August until 16 October. It was torture by starving. They let us rinse ourselves once in three weeks.

Skachkov says:

At first, they were almost not feeding us. For one hundred people, they gave eight loaves of bread and a pot of porridge per day. We cut the bread with some metal pieces and eating the porridge with the crust. We ate out of lamps instead of plates. We took down several lamps from the ceiling. I lost twenty kilograms.

Below are testimonies of other prisoners:

This is how they were feeding us: they brought a five-liter pot with porridge and gave it to anyone who had something. Some people made plates from cardboard or other materials, and some people were eating with their hands. They fed us once or twice per day. We had water from the tap where we used the toilet. It also happened twice, in the morning and in the evening. When we collected water upstairs, we saw some sunshine, some rays reached us.

There was one big tub next to the door, 130-140 cm, where they poured porridge from the buckets. They did not give us anything to eat with, so people did what they could - someone used their hands, some people found thick paper among the documents and made a ‘spoon’.

Another former SSU prisoner said that, in the summer 2014, the ‘militiamen’ had good supplies and, therefore, the food given to prisoners was not bad:

The food was quite good. [There was] porridge, liver, pieces of meat, you could get full. They [ate] from the cafeteria - they had enough food. They were fed - two first courses, two second course, tea, coffee, candies, and they had such service there - napkings, good supplies… They even gave cigarettes.

According to Donbas battalion fighter Dmytro ‘Simka’ Kulish (photo below) who spend nine months in captivity, prisoners could receive packages from volunteers and relatives, however, they went through the medical unit. Lusya, a medic from this unit, took most of the packages:

“I call her ‘’the great doctor Lusya. She weighed approximately 150 kilos. She got so big during our time there. If a package weighed 20 kilos, we received only two, and the rest went to Lusya. I told her that she would blow up soon and she wouldn’t be able to go through the door”.

There were bottles to be used as a toilet in the cells. They could also take people out, sometimes when asked, but the guards also established a ‘toilet schedule’ requesting to gather into groups twice per day, in the morning and in the evening. People who did not want to go or did not fit into the group had to wait for another opportunity to use the toilet.

They did not give us any rules on what was allowed or prohibited. We found out from each other. For instance, while waiting to use the toilet you were not allowed to stand beyond the line. People who did not know that could be hit with a buttstock on their toes.

Violence

Physical and psychological violence was regularly used during interrogations. Most often, these were cruel beatings, after which people returned to the cell all blue. Some people were in such bad condition that they were taken to the nearest remand prison to avoid dealing with the heavily wounded who could possibly die.

They also used mock executions, tore out the nails, squeezed fingers with the door. There were cases when they beat people up for fun or when drunk, without disguising at as an interrogation.

They were not executing people in these offices. There was already a lot of blood there, we washed it, they took us from the cells to wash. They made a mess out of a person. Sometime, they brought people who were all purple, wetting themselves, barely alive, like a jello. People with no chances to survive were sent to SIZO to die there. Prisoners from battalions were not sent to militsiya, they were taken for executions. The conscripts were kept for exchange, beaten a little. Volunteers were sent for executions. I remember a young skinny man with bandages on his head; they brought him… I knew it was over for him...

Medical assistance

The SSU base had its own medical unit, however, prisoners received minimum of assistance, if any. For the most part, detained medics tried to treat the victims.

Kulish talks about being refused help:

On the first day at Donetsk SSU I was beaten so bad that I could not walk for a month. They broke four batons while hitting me. They also beat up other people, but it was worse for me since I was the biggest… I was captured after a blast injury and a shrapnel wound in the back of my head. They threw me to the basement. My entire body was hurting, and then I realized I could not feel my legs anymore. There was a medic in the cell who said that it looked like a spinal compression fracture. In addition, the collarbone was broken, several ribs, my foot and both knees were injured. However, the ‘separatists’ said, ‘You are pretending since you don’t have the pain face’.

A former SSU prisoner describes the monthly medical check up procedure:

There were check ups once a month right there, at the SSU territory. They took 10 people outside. Two of our detained medics were doing the check up supervised by their two ‘medics’. The check up went like this: they lifted a person’s clothes and looked for rashes, lice, and asked whether there were any health complaints. If necessary, they gave some pills.

Forced labour

In Donetsk SSU, prisoners were actively used for forced labor. They were forced to wash the floor, clean the toilets, help out in the kitchen, build fortifications, dig trenches, unload humanitarian cargo from Russia, and move bodies in the morgue.

We were taken for work to the city or at the SSU territory where Sparta unit was based, and we had to clean their premises. They took us for work everyday, approximately at 9-10 in the morning, and brought us back at 2-3 pm. They didn’t always feed us at work, at the storage mostly yes, at Sparta - no.

Supervisors during work had different attitude. Sometimes, they would intimidate [us], sometimes they made us work harder. I was not beaten, but there were cases like this. For instance,  they were beating *** for half an hour during the cleaning of Sparta’s room, and then gave a sweet and two cigarettes… *** , who was detained separately from us, was constantly beaten and forced to do the dirtiest work (clean the toilet).

Andriy Nalyvayko, who spent most of the time at the archives, said that the guards would order prisoners to make lists for labour. Often, life depended on these lists. The easiest work was at the medical unit, cleaning the SSU territory, at the kitchen (though people had to work for 18 hours a day there). Being assigned to the morgue in Kalininsky district was much worse:

In the summer, it resembled hell. It was packed, summer, heat, piles of wet cloths, liquid was dripping from under everyone, everyone weighed 70-80-1000 kilos, and you had to drag them, mop the puddles of  lymph fluid. There, one would vomit so much...

However, he says that the scariest task was to dig trenches at the frontline as Ukrainian army was advancing. Not everyone survived. For instance, one time the list included 62 people, and only 32 returned. Another time, 50 prisoners were sent to Torez but they did not even get there - the convoy was hit, and only 20 people returned alive.

Executions and deaths

There are also reports of executions. For instance, prisoners who were taken to dig trenches at the frontline also digged graves for those condemned to deaths, and then buried the bodies. There were no gravestones. Relatives were not informed about the place of burial, they simply said that so-and-so was executed