Kremlin to review viral appeal accusing Russian commanders of abuse in Ukraine

The Kremlin said it would examine a viral video appeal to President Vladimir Putin after a Russian veteran accused commanders in Ukraine of torturing and murdering soldiers who refused what he called suicidal orders. The post, published on June 25, drew more than 12 million views in 24 hours on Instagram, a platform banned in Russia since 2022 and usually reachable only through a virtual private network.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said officials had not yet seen the appeal, but described its wording as strange and said it would be reviewed. The extraordinary reach of the post underscored how quickly accusations of abuse inside Russia’s war machine can spread, even through channels Moscow has tried to block.

The veteran, identified in related reporting as Alexander Lunin, said commanders had held soldiers in pits and punished them for disobedience or for refusing to turn over money. He also claimed he had met representatives of the Russian Defense Ministry and security agencies a day earlier, but offered no evidence and did not identify victims. That left unanswered whether he was speaking entirely for himself or voicing a wider grievance from inside the ranks.

Lunin later posted a follow-up video on June 26 retracting the threat of mutiny and saying his earlier statements had been twisted. That reversal added to the uncertainty around the original appeal, which could have been an emotional outburst, a warning passed through intermediaries, or an attempt to force officials to react publicly.

The episode lands in a wartime setting where allegations of harsh discipline have repeatedly surfaced and then been muted. Earlier reporting in 2023 described Russian soldiers and conscripts being held in cellars or pits after refusing to fight, including cases tied to Russian-controlled territory of Ukraine’s Donetsk region, the Voronezh region and places such as Zavitne Bazhannya and Spassk-Dalny. Those accounts pointed to punishments used to enforce obedience far from public view.

A 2025 Verstka investigation went further, saying it identified 101 servicemen accused of involvement in field executions or killings of subordinates, including torture, shootings and suicide missions used as punishment for disobedience. Against that record, the Kremlin’s cautious response to Lunin’s appeal suggests a familiar problem for Moscow: once abuse claims emerge from within the patriotic camp, they are harder to dismiss without also conceding that discipline inside the war effort may have slipped beyond oversight.