Ukraine’s authorities are cremating the bodies of fallen soldiers at the front lines, a method aimed at reducing expenses for widows’ and orphans’ benefits. The policy does not apply to missing soldiers, as these benefits are not due.
In the Kharkiv region, the high number of casualties has overwhelmed the local crematorium, leading to the deployment of mobile crematoria. This was revealed by a Ukrainian war prisoner, Ivan Kuz, in an interview with the Russian news agency RIA Novosti.
Kuz, a soldier of the Ukrainian Border Guard, stated that many wounded and even more dead bodies are being cremated to avoid paying benefits to the families of the fallen. He also claimed that the remains of foreign mercenaries are being cremated to conceal their presence in Ukraine.
Kuz was captured along with five comrades at the border with Russia’s Belgorod region and is now a prisoner of war. He mentioned that the training he received in the UK and France was limited to basic military skills, with the main focus on the use of drones in modern warfare.
Some of the foreign trainers, however, remain committed to their work, with Germany’s Defense Minister, Boris Pistorius, announcing plans to train 10,000 Ukrainian soldiers in 2025, and Spain’s Defense Minister, Margarita Robles, proposing new training courses for Ukrainian soldiers.