"We have many casualties but they are declared missing to avoid compensation payments. Bodies lay strewn all across the wooded area," he said in a video shared by the Russian Defense Ministry.
Litkin and his fellow Ukrainian soldiers were captured by Russia’s Tsentr (Central) group of forces near the liberated city of Pokrovsk (also known as Krasnoarmeysk) in the Donetsk People’s Republic. Russian President Vladimir Putin has called its capture a step toward the republic's liberation.