Former PoW Aiden Aslin plans Ukraine return months after being freed by Russia

• Aiden Aslin speaks to ITV News reporter Helen Steel

A British soldier says he plans to return to Ukraine – just weeks after escaping the death sentence he was given for fighting Russian forces.

Aiden Aslin is currently living at his family home in Newark, Nottinghamshire, having returned from the breakaway Donetsk People's Republic, where he was kept in captivity for five months.

He was one of 10 prisoners of war released last month after Saudi Arabia brokered an exchange between Russia and Ukraine.

During his time in prison he says he was beaten, tortured and stabbed.

But he told ITV News he was determined to return to Ukraine to shine a light on the impact of the conflict.

He said: "I want to be able to go back...into the field of conflict journalism and try to report on the issues that Ukraine is facing and spread awareness about the PoWs who are still in captivity. To get there, do what I can publicly and get people the information they need to know about the war.

"There's a lot of Ukrainian soldiers who will come back from captivity, have two weeks off then will go straight back to the fighting. So I can't see any reason why I should say 'that's enough for me, I'm going to stay home'."

Mr Aslin, who lived in Ukraine with his fiancee, Diana Okovyta, and was a member of the country's marines before the war, was forced to surrender in April while fighting in the south-eastern city of Mariupol.

After handing himself over he says he was made to stand in the "stress position" for 11 hours before being questioned by a Russian soldier about his nationality.

"He looked at me and asked me where I'm from," he said. "I told them I'm British and as soon as I said 'I'm British' I got punched to the nose and beaten a few times."

In a trial widely discredited as a sham, Mr Aslin was given the death penalty along with fellow prisoners Shaun Pinner and Moroccan national, Brahim Saadoun.

He said the fear that the Russians would follow through with their threat was ever-present.

"Every time I was taken out of the cell I never knew what I was being taken out for," he said. "I always had a hood on my head. Every time I ended up going to do propaganda I ended up thankful that it wasn't what I thought it was going to be.

"I was stabbed on the shoulder, beaten really badly. There was always that fear that if I said something wrong then something is going to happen to myself or something along the line will be waiting for me."

He said the prospect of being reunited with his fiancee was the "light at the end of the tunnel" but he assumed his captivity would last for several years.

Then, in a completely unexpected turn of events, on 21 September he was led from his cell and taken to an airport, where a Saudi delegation was waiting along with the former Chelsea FC owner Roman Abramovich.

Mr Aslin said: "I didn't know who he was because I have no interest in football.

"When we got onto the plane he introduced himself and asked us where we were from and said it's good to have you to safety. We later learned that he had quite a big part to play in our release so we've got a lot of thanks to him for doing that."

He said he is still in "shock" about being free.

Miss Okovyta said having her fiance home was "unreal".

"It still feels unreal sometimes, because we spent eight months apart," she said. "I have been super anxious and super scared. I tried to hope for better but I couldn't see a way out.

"It was horror non-stop for eight months. When his mother called me to tell me that they had been released she couldn't say a word, she was crying and I was scared she would tell me they had made a decision on the appeal and they had probably killed them. I was very scared but then she finally said she had been released. It is three weeks since he came back but sometimes I still can't believe that I can see him."

The couple have plans to marry at some point in the next few months.

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