It was mid-March and 16-year-old Dasha was about six months pregnant.
One of the soldiers, whom Dasha said was drunk, began to ask how many rooms there were in the house and the age of the children.
An incident followed, which Ukrainian prosecutors say is a war crime.
While the unbridled violence around Kyiv embodies the senseless ferocity of Russia’s pressure on civilians, dark and untold stories of their brutality are slowly emerging in small, remote villages such as Dasha in Ukraine’s southern Kherson region.
These stories help to outline a model of a Russian army riddled with criminal behavior and, in this case, an alleged attack on a minor in its most vulnerable area.
Dasha said that when the children, a 12- and 14-year-old girl, saw the soldiers in their kitchen, they were frightened.
“First he (the drunken soldier) called my mother to another room. He released her quickly. Then he called me, “she said.
“When I came in, he first told me how he had saved two people in our village – a mother with two children,” she said.
But then the soldier, whom Dasha later learned was from Donetsk and was called “Son” by other soldiers, became violent.
“He started screaming, first telling me to undress. I told him I wouldn’t do it and (he) started screaming at me. And he said if he didn’t undress, he would kill me,” she told CNN. .
At that moment, the other soldier entered the room and warned Blue that he would have trouble with the rest of the unit if he pursued his obvious plan.
Blue seemed unperturbed by the warning, Dasha said, and his colleague left, telling him only to return to the ward in 30 minutes.
“When I resisted, he strangled me and said he would kill me. Then he made an unimaginable threat, she said, telling her, “Either sleep with me now or I’ll bring 20 more people.”
Dasha’s story was interrupted by her sobs. Her mother sat beside her as she spoke, also visibly upset.
“I only remember that he had blue eyes and it was dark and I didn’t remember anything,” she said.
Dasha says that after she was raped, the perpetrator tried to attack her several times, while two Russian snipers intervened to help, taking her and her family to another house.
CNN did not identify the victims of sexual violence and in this case referred to Dasha by pseudonym.
She was told there that Blue had been killed, she said. Dasha later learned that this was a lie when she was summoned by a Russian paratrooper commander to a nearby village to discuss her attack.
But it was not a conversation, she said. Instead, it was a horrific interrogation.
“He (the commander) is using some psychological tactics,” Dasha said.
“He started saying the same things the rapist had told me, yelling at me and (saying he would) do the same thing as the rapist. I was so scared and I started crying.
After being upset, Dasha said that the commander decided he was telling the truth. It is not clear what happened to the Blue.
Dasha had heard other Russian soldiers say that her perpetrator had a “criminal past.” She believes he was looking for a goal.
“We were told that he was touring the village,” Dasha said, “and he was looking for someone who could …” a girl of light strength, “as they said.
CNN turned to the Russian Ministry of Defense for comment.
About a week after the alleged attack, the Russians left her village.
A report by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), published on 13 April, found violations of international humanitarian law by Russian forces in Ukraine, noting that “reports show cases of gender-based violence related to conflict, such as rape, sexual violence or sexual harassment. “
CNN could not independently verify Dasha’s torturous account, but Ukrainian prosecutors in the Kherson region said in a statement that they were investigating her account.
In a statement, prosecutors said: “Thanks to the testimony of the victim and the results of a number of investigative actions, it was established in early March 2022, during the occupation of a village where there was no military facility of Ukrainian servicemen, (there were) war crimes against civilians, including the rape of a minor resident of the village. “
Prosecutors declined to provide further details, citing privacy concerns.
As parts of the country seek to recover, the trauma of the Russian occupation continues to terrorize communities in the south. Its brutality is visible on roads, buildings and homes. But for survivors like Dasha, the trauma of this profession will live long below the surface.
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