How Russia tries to turn desperate Ukrainians into traitors

Svitlana says she never considered betraying her country, “not for a second.”

“My husband would never have forgiven me,” she says as we meet in her apartment near kyiv.

The 42-year-old woman had been waiting for more than two years for news about her husband Dima, a military doctor captured by Russia, when she suddenly received a phone call.

The voice on the other end of the phone told him that if he committed treason against Ukraine, Dima might be entitled to better treatment in prison, or even an early release.

“A Ukrainian number called me. I answered and the man introduced himself as Dmitry,” explains Svitlana. “He spoke with a Russian accent.”

“He said, ‘You can burn down a military enlistment office, set fire to a military vehicle, or sabotage an electrical box on the Ukrainian railways.'”

There was another option: reveal the location of nearby air defense units, vital military assets that keep Ukraine’s skies safe from Russian drones and missiles.

When Dmitry laid out his proposal, Svitlana says she remembered the instructions that Ukrainian authorities had distributed to all families in case Russian agents approached: buy as much time as possible, record and photograph everything, and report it.

Svitlana reported him and took screenshots of the messages, which she showed to the BBC.

Ukraine’s Security Service, the SBU, told him to detain the Russians while they investigated. So he pretended to agree to bomb a local railroad line.

As we sit in her immaculate living room, with air raid sirens blaring periodically outside, she plays me recordings she made on her phone of two of the voice calls with Dmitry, made through the Telegram app. During the call, he gives instructions on how to make and place a Molotov cocktail.

“Pour in a liter of starter fluid and a little gasoline,” explains Dmitri. “Go to some kind of railroad crossing. Make sure there are no security cameras. Put on a hat, just in case.”

He also gave Svitlana a tutorial on how to put her phone in airplane mode once she was 1 to 2 kilometers away from her intended target, to prevent her signal from being picked up by cell towers that researchers might use.

“Do you know what a relay box is? Take a photo of it. This should be the target of their arson attack,” Dmitri explained, demanding proof that the task had been completed.

“Write today’s date on a piece of paper and take a photo with this piece of paper.”

In exchange, Dmitry said she could arrange a phone call with her husband or have a package delivered.

The SBU later told Svitlana that the man she had been speaking to was indeed in Russia and that she should break contact. Svitlana told Dmitry that she had changed her mind.

“That’s when the threats started,” says Svitlana, “he said they would kill my husband and I would never see him again.

For days, she kept calling and saying, “Your husband is being tortured and it’s your fault!”

“How worried were you that he might follow through with his threats to harm Dima?” I ask Svitlana. His eyes become moist. “My heart hurt and I could only pray, ‘God, please don’t let that happen.'”

“Part of me said, ‘This person has no connection to the prisoners.’ The other part asks, ‘What if he really can do it? How would I live with myself?'”

In a statement to the BBC, the SBU said that cooperating with Russian agents “will in no way alleviate the plight of the prisoner; on the contrary, it may significantly complicate his chances of being exchanged.”

Authorities are urging all family members to come forward immediately if approached by Russian agents.

Those who do so, they say, will be “protected” and treated as victims.

But if relatives agree to commit sabotage or espionage, the SBU says, “this can be considered treason. The maximum penalty is life imprisonment.”

Authorities regularly publish arrests of Ukrainians who allegedly commit arson or reveal the location of military sites to Russia.

Pro-Kremlin media are inundated with videos purporting to show Ukrainians setting fire to military vehicles or railway electrical boxes.

Some of the culprits do it for money, paid by suspected Russian agents, but there are also believed to be attacks carried out by desperate relatives.

Petro Yatsenko of the Ukrainian military’s Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War says that about 50% of all POW families are contacted by Russian agents.

“They are in a very vulnerable position and some of them are willing to do anything,” Petro says, “but we are trying to educate them that it will not help (their loved ones in captivity).”

Petro says that an act like setting fire to a military vehicle is not considered a significant material loss for the Armed Forces of Ukraine:

“But it can destabilize the unity of Ukrainian society, so that is the main problem.

And of course, if someone shares the location of, for example, air defense systems, that is also a big problem for us,” he admits.

Authorities do not publish the number of Ukrainians detained as prisoners of war, but it is believed to exceed 8,000.

A Ukrainian intelligence source told the BBC that the number of cases in which relatives agree to work with Russia is small.

The Russian government told the BBC in a statement that accusations that it uses prisoners’ families as leverage are “baseless” and that Russia treats “Ukrainian fighters humanely and in full compliance with the Geneva Convention.”

The statement goes on to accuse Ukraine of using the same methods:

“Ukrainian handlers are actively attempting to coerce Russian residents into committing acts of sabotage and arson within Russian territory, targeting critical infrastructure and civilian facilities.”

Svitlana’s husband, Dima, was released from captivity just over three months ago.

The couple are now happily back together and enjoy playing with their four-year-old son, Vova.

How did Svitlana feel when her husband was finally released?

“There were tears of joy like I had never cried before,” she beams. “I felt like I had snatched my love from the jaws of death.”

Dima told his wife that the Russians did not follow through on their threats to punish him for his refusal to cooperate.

When Svitlana told him about the calls, he was shocked.

“He asked me how I was feeling,” he says and winks at me. “Well, like I always say, I’m an officer’s wife.”