Ukrainians press online campaign to free scholar from separatist jail

Ukrainians are taking to social media to post pictures of themselves holding a sheet of paper with #FreeKozlovskyy written on it – a campaign to raise awareness of the plight of an academic held in a jail controlled by Kremlin-backed separatists for more than a year.

Ihor Kozlovskyy, a historian and religious scholar, has been imprisoned by separatists in Donetsk for more than 400 days — he is one of more than 100 Ukrainian soldiers and civilians imprisoned in the Russian-controlled part of the Donbas.

Kozlovskyy is accused of keeping two grenades at home, according to his relatives, who call the accusation nonsense.

Singer Jamala, the winner of the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest, musician Dmytro Shurov, Ukrainian band Onuka and other Ukrainian celebrities have joined in the campaign, which started last week.

Kozlovskyy, 63, who taught at Donetsk National Technical University before the war, was abducted by Russian-backed separatists on Jan. 27 from his apartment in Donetsk, where he was staying to look after his disabled son.

The arrest took place after someone blew up a monument to Vladimir Lenin in the center of Donetsk, an event which some observers believe was staged by separatists to start a wave of terror against pro-Ukrainian activists still remaining in Donetsk.

Kozlovskyy had previously been an activist: in March-October 2014, he organized an inter-confessional marathon “for peace and unity in Ukraine,” which was later banned by the separatists.

But his family say he was no longer actively opposing those who had seized control of Donetsk from the local authorities.

“He wasn’t afraid to stay in Donetsk, as he wasn’t doing any activity that could be considered as hostile to the (separatist) regime,” his nephew Denys Kozlovskyy said in an interview with the news website Ostro.org, which focuses on news from the Donbas.

The separatist authorities have not given any details about Kozlovskyy’s case, and they have not allowed the scholar’s family to visit him in prison.

His relatives fear for his health, saying he has been kept for a long time in a basement prison cell intended for those serving life sentences.

In reaction to the social media campaign, Vasyl Hrytsak, the head of Ukraine’s SBU security service, said on March 17 that Kozlovskyy’s name would be included on the list of Ukrainian hostages planned for exchange for captured separatists.

Iryna Gerashchenko, the deputy parliament speaker and Ukraine’s humanitarian representative in the Minsk contact group, wrote in a post on Facebook that as of March 16 the exchange list included 118 Ukrainian soldiers and civilians.