‘Underground clinic’ treats rebels

 ROSTOV-ON-DON, Russia – Training bases, border crossings and burials on the sly – the southern Russian region of Rostov has been buzzing with reports of covert military activity since conflict broke out in neighboring eastern Ukraine last spring. Now, a prominent Russian magazine says militants maimed in the conflict are being treated at a secretive facility in the provincial capital, Rostov-on-Don, the latest evidence that separatist fighters are being quietly transferred across the border for care. Rostov-based journalist Yelena Romanova says she has discovered a makeshift clinic caring for men who lost limbs while fighting government forces in eastern Ukraine, where more than 6,400 people have been killed and some 16,000 wounded since April 2014. Her article, which appeared on June 1 in The New Times, features interviews with recovering fighters and photos of maimed patients. “This is an underground rehabilitation center for people injured in the fighting,” she wrote. “Most of those brought here have lost limbs. Most of them are Ukrainians,” but at least one was identified as being from Russia. The report casts further doubt on Russia’s repeated denials of involvement in the conflict. According to Ms. Romanova, the clinic is located in a detached house in a quiet neighborhood of Rostov-on-Don. One of the “coordinators” running the clinic, a man identified as Igor, told her that the clinic was currently treating 34 men and had seen some 150 patients in total. He refused to reveal how the facility was funded, saying only that it relied on private donations. RFE/RL reported on a similar facility in Azov, a city in the Rostov region, in February. Two dozen Ukrainian separatists were receiving treatment there at the time. The clinic had also been set up in a private home. And like their peers in Rostov-on-Don, the patients had no idea who was footing their medical bills. (Claire Bigg and Grigory Bakunin of RFE/RL)