Arsène Sabanieev, an anesthetist, traveled back and forth between Lille, where he lives, and the different combat zones in Ukraine. He published the book “Freedom or Death” and spoke of the “destroyed Ukrainian culture”.
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Reading time: 8 min
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This Franco-Ukrainian anesthetist-resuscitator engaged on the front for two years published, Thursday February 8, Freedom or death published by Robert Laffont. Its last rotation dates back to November 2023 near Lyman, a Ukrainian town located in Donetsk Oblast. “I was a Ukrainian when the conflict broke out, explains Arsène Sabanieev. I left the country with my partner and very quickly the reality set in, telling me that I had to come back and help.” For him there is no doubt, it is indeed a “war of extermination”. “Ukrainian culture is destroyed, young children are Russified,” underlines this Franco-Ukrainian anesthetist-resuscitator. The counter-offensive launched at the beginning of June to break through the enemy lines was a failure. Russia still controls 20% of Ukrainian territory.
War crimes
In the book Arsene Sabanieev recalls the images that struck him during the conflict. On April 3, 2022, he remembers a bus marked children being machine-gunned near kyiv. “There is a big difference between knowing that these war crimes exist and proving through our senses that they took place,” resumes Arsène Sabanieev. “Until we have experienced this moment we cannot really understand what pushes me to commit.”
