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In September 2022, Moscow illegally annexed the regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, to go with its seizure of Crimea.

“Everyone knows if you use drugs in the trenches, of course, the dugout is small,” a 29-year-old soldier from Siberia assigned to a unit fighting near Lugansk in the disputed Donbas region told Vertska.

Amnesty said the confession was made under duress, noting for example that Butkevych refers to the Russian-controlled Luhansk region of Ukraine as the Lugansk People's Republic, the term used by Moscow.

In January, Mr. Dronov traveled to the occupied Ukrainian cities of Mariupol and Lugansk, playing for soldiers.

He said leaders of the Lugansk People’s Republic, the territory in Luhansk controlled by Russian-backed separatists, declared a general mobilisation, adding it was “either fight or get shot, there is no other choice”.