More on Putin's hostage taking politics

We interrupt our postings on the Referendum campaigns to bring you some information about President Putin and his hostage taking campaign. Here is an item on today's Daily Vertical

Russia may have released its most famous hostage, but it is still holding dozens more.

According to human rights groups, as many as 30 Ukrainian citizens remain in Russian prisons on what appear to be very flimsy charges.

Among them are Stanislav Klykh and Mykola Karpyuk, two Ukrainian nationalists who were sentenced yesterday to long prison sentences on dubious charges that they fought alongside Chechen separatists in the 1990s.

There are allegations that the two were tortured.

Their conviction was largely based on the testimony of one man.

The witness in question appears to be in prison himself and, therefore, subject to some pressure. Were the two even in Chechnya? Who knows?

The hostage list also includes the Ukrainian filmmaker Oleh Sentsov and activist Oleksandr Kolchenko, Crimea residents imprisoned on absurd terrorism charges after they openly opposed Russia's forceful and illegal annexation of the peninsula.

And then there is the 73-year-old Ukrainian pensioner Yuriy Soloshenko, who is suffering from cancer. He's serving a six-year sentence in a maximum security prison on clearly absurd spying charges.

Numerous Crimean Tatars, including the deputy head of the Mejlis, are also incarcerated on fictitious terrorism charges.

Not surprisingly, Vladimir Putin's Ukrainian hostages were all abducted after Russia's seizure of Crimea and its intervention in the Donbas.

Let us not forget various Russian political prisoners, foremost among whom is Oleg Navalny, Alexey Navalny's brother, also a hostage in a manner of speaking, though his imprisonment did not achieve the desired result.

[Referendum campaign anger service will resume forthwith with the criticism already received taken into account.]