Australian man Oscar Jenkins needs deal after being captured by Russian troops

Anthony Albanese faces another high-stakes effort to secure the release of an imprisoned Australian after Melbourne man Oscar Jenkins was captured by Russian forces while fighting for Ukraine in the country’s eastern Donbas region.

The Australian man Oscar Jenkins who has been captured by Russian forces. Picture: Telegram

Anthony Albanese faces another high-stakes effort to secure the ­release of an imprisoned Australian after Melbourne man Oscar Jenkins was captured by Russian forces while fighting for Ukraine in the country’s eastern Donbas region.

The 32-year-old teacher, vegan activist and Ukrainian foreign legion fighter faces decades in a Russian prison, or worse, ­unless a deal can be done for him to be returned home.

Russia’s ambassador to Australia, Alexey Pavlovsky, was called into the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade on Monday for talks on Mr Jenkins’ plight, amid calls for him to be swapped for self-styled “Aussie Cossack” Simeon Boikov, who is holed up in Russia’s Sydney consulate but wanted by NSW police.

It is believed to be the first time an Australian has been taken prisoner by Russian forces in Ukraine, with his capture coming just a week after the Prime Minister ­secured the release of the remaining Bali Nine heroin traffickers from their Indonesian jail cells.

Acting Foreign Minister Mark Dreyfus appealed to the Kremlin to treat Mr Jenkins humanely after Russian video footage showed him being beaten and abused. “The Australian government is making representations to the Russian government,” Mr Dreyfus said. “We urge the Russian government to fully adhere to its obligations under inter­national humanitarian law, including with respect to prisoners of war.”

He said the government was trying to establish Mr Jenkins’ ­location and wellbeing, and was providing support to his family, as he reiterated to Australians: “Do not travel to Ukraine.”

Oscar Jenkins wears an anti-meat T-shirt.

After news of the Australian’s capture broke, Russian politician Viktor Petrovich Vodolatsky called for a prisoner swap involving Boikov, who was granted Russian citizenship last year in a special decree by Vladimir Putin.

Mr Vodolatsky, the chairman of the Union of the Russian Foreign Cossack Forces and a member of the Russian Duma, said: “Russia will make every effort to resolve this exchange issue and all Russian Cossacks will, of course, support us.”

Boikov, who entered the Russian consulate in December 2022 to avoid two NSW warrants, told The Australian the proposed prisoner swap was the only way to save Mr Jenkins from a Russian gulag.

He said he had appealed to Russian officials: “Don’t beat him. Don’t kill him. Let’s exchange him.”

“It’s clear on the video that they’re interrogating him, and they’ve been beating him as they’re interrogating him, because the Russians don’t look kindly upon mercenaries,” he told The Australian. “So the only way this Jenkins character is ever going to return back to Australia safely and quickly is if there’s a deal on the table. And I’m happy to be part of a deal.”

Sydney barrister Bruce Levet, who is representing the Australian-born Boikov, said he had written to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade seeking to establish the government’s position on the matter.

Mr Levet told The Australian that from a legal point of view, the proposed exchange was “certainly possible”.

“In terms of whether there’s a political appetite for it, I’m probably not the person to ask,” he said.

Mr Jenkins completing a cross country race in China in 2017. Picture: Instagram

Mr Jenkins attended Melbourne Grammar, played cricket for Prahran and later taught ­biology at a Chinese university. An undated social media clip shows the proud vegan urging the Chinese to stop eating meat.

The Russian video, circulated by pro-Putin accounts on Telegram, shows the Australian being aggressively interrogated as he tries to communicate in English, broken Ukrainian and French.

At one point, he is asked in Russian: “Do you want to live?” The Australian misunderstands the question, replying: “Live? I am in Kramatorsk, not far.” Mr Jenkins, looking shocked, is hit on the side of the head twice in the footage, with his interrogator telling him in ­Russian: “Don’t blame me for slapping you. Where are you from? Where are you from? Nationality? F..k, talk faster.”

He gives his name and age, tells his captors he is a teacher and a soldier, and that he lives in Australia and Ukraine.

In the second half of the two-minute reel, Jenkins is shown with his hands tied with duct tape in front of his body. He tells his captors he is being paid in Ukraine currency, prompting one of the Russians to declare: “So you are here for the money? You moron.”

The lead interrogator tells the prisoner he will face a trial and jail.

Retired Major General Mick Ryan, who has been a regular visitor to Ukraine during the war, said Mr Jenkins faced a difficult time as a prisoner of war amid Russia’s “systemic abuse” of captured soldiers. “They don’t treat any prisoners of war under the Geneva Convention. I’ve spent time with the folks who do these prisoner exchanges, and pretty much almost all the POWs are tortured or abused or both.”

Three foreign mercenaries, including Briton Aiden Aslin, were handed death sentences when captured in 2022, before being released in a prisoner exchange.