Staff Sgt. Gordon Black is 34 years old, a U.S. soldier with 16 years of service, most recently stationed in South Korea. He has a wife from whom he is estranged and who filed for divorce in 2022, a 6-year-old daughter, and parents back home in the U.S. And he reportedly has — or had — a girlfriend in Vladivostok, Russia, whom he met while in South Korea, where she had lived for five years and was working in a bar.

Black left South Korea last week for his new assignment at Fort Cavazos, Texas, where he was to report within two weeks. But instead of traveling straight to the U.S., he detoured to Vladivostok by way of China. Black’s mother and estranged wife believe the young woman, identified as Aleksandra Vashchuk, having returned home from South Korea, “lured” him to Russia for one last meeting. When he landed on May 2nd, he was arrested and charged with “secretly stealing property” of a person identified only as “citizen T.” He is being held until at least July 2nd, according to a spokesperson for the Pervomaisky District Court.

The U.S. Defense Department is investigating whether Black was specifically targeted by Russian intelligence services; the Russian Foreign Affairs Ministry has said Black’s detention had nothing to do with politics or espionage. We shall see what transpires by the end of his two-month detention. In the meantime, Staff Sgt. Gordon Black makes it onto the list of Putin’s HOSTAGES.

*. *. *

And reports of arrests for spurious reasons continue to crop up. Just two examples are the February 2022 detention of 21-year-old university student Danuta Perednya, sentenced to 6-1/2 years for reposting a message on social media app Telegram criticizing the war in Ukraine; and the October 2023 arrest of another university student, Olesya Krivtsova, for posting an Instagram story also criticizing the war in Ukraine. In the latter case — in circumstances far too reminiscent of the Stalin era — Krivtsova was reported to authorities by some fellow students at their university in Arkhangelsk. She has since been added to a list of terrorists and extremists, charged with discrediting the military. She has been placed under house arrest, and is facing as long as seven years in prison.

There has been little or no publicity concerning the estimated hundreds of such cases; there are just too many, and too often they simply fall between the cracks. But the Russian prison system is overflowing with them, for the simple act of reposting an article, or speaking out against the war in Ukraine. Clearly, the worst years of the Soviet Union are being revisited upon the Russian populace.

*. *. *.

And so, I once again implore you, please do not forget those who remain HOSTAGES; their families and friends haven’t. And here, one more time, are their pictures as a weekly reminder that they are real, and truly suffering. In no particular order, they are:

Brendochka
5/12/24