Masked men occupy a building in Crimea/Ukrainskaya Pravda

A recent spring day turned into hell for one Ukrainian activist who was kidnapped on March 16 after a group of armed men broke into his parents’ apartment in Sevastopol, Crimea. 

Evgeniy Melnichuk, 31, a member of the youth wing of “Udar,” an opposition party led by Vitaly Klichko, spent nine hours in the basement of what he claims looked like a navy base located in Crimea, where he was held by several people who beat and interrogated him.

Melnichuk’s political activity started at Maidan in December. He came to the Kiev’s main square and held an opposition banner each day. As the tension between police and protesters escalated, he started operating from the Maidan informational center, handling food, medication and fundraising. Overall, he spent one hundred days on Maidan before taking a train back to his hometown Sevastopol, Crimea. 

READ MORE: Ukrainian Serviceman Killed As Russian Annexes Crimea.

In the first weeks, when pro-Russians forces were taking over the Crimean administrative and military property, he delivered food to Ukrainian military bases, sparking the disapproval of pro-Russian oriented groups.

“In Sevastopol, if you’re not like everyone else, you’re an enemy,” he said. 

In late February, one of the local websites posted a picture of Melnichuk and his family captioned: “The maidowns, (a derogatory word for Kiev’s protesters) in Sevastopol.” 

“The situation is that it’s not safe for Euromaidan activists to remain in Crimea,” said Sevgil Musaieva, an editor at Hubs. According to Musaieva, kidnappers are former members of Berkut and other military groups supporting Russian annexation. 

The day before the kidnapping, Melnichuk was at his apartment when a group of men tried to slam through his front door. When he looked out from his balcony, he realized that his apartment building was surrounded by unidentified people in military uniforms with masks and assault rifles. 

Despite the worrisome situation, Melnichuk said that initially he felt safe because he was in his apartment. 

“I thought my home was my castle, but I was wrong,” he said. A few minutes later, someone finally knocked off his door and Melnichuk met “two people with assault rifles and one with a Makarov pistol.”   

READ MORE: Crimean Residents Afraid Of The Future

After realizing that someone had cut the electricity from his apartment, Melnichuk called and asked his friends for help, but retreated after realizing just how many men were surrounding him. 

The assailants punched him and searched his apartment, turning it into a “pogrom,” according to Melnichuk. They threw off drawers and shelves, taking anything valuable—from passports and money to his car keys to family photo albums. The men handcuffed Melnichuk and dragged him to the street where another group waited in a car.

But they didn’t take him. 

“We have to take him back because of the militia,” Melnichuk overheard one man say. The group let him go and disappeared after the police—called by concerned neighbors—arrived. At the police station, he filed an armed robbery report and moved to his parents’ apartment on the other side of the city. 

On Sunday, the day after the first break-in, someone knocked on his parents’ apartment door. He looked through a peephole and saw another group of men—just 10 to 12 people this time. Melnichuk opened the door, only to have a gun pointed at his mother’s face, demanding that Melnichuk walk out. 

As the group was leaving the building, several neighbors and Melnichuk’s mother phoned the police. But this time no one arrived. The group handcuffed him, put him in a car, pushed his face to the floor and began to drive.

READ MORE: Ukraine: Russia Wants 'Division And Destruction' Of Ukraine

After 20 minutes the kidnappers finally pulled over at an unrecognizable building and took him to a basement. When Melnichuk entered, the kidnappers threw him onto the floor, pulled his knitted cap over his face and the assault began; they kicked him in the groin and stomach before someone stepped on his face. 

“My head and back were covered with bumps, but I had no bruises,” Melnichuk reflected.

A trio of men came in and began interrogating him on why he arrived in Crimea and where was he hiding right wing “fascists.” Melnichuk believed that two of the men were locals, and one was a member of the FSB (Russian Federal Security Service). 

"The FSB guy", Melnichuck said, "asked different questions. He looked at my wife’s name and asked if her last name was of Uygur origin; so I thought he had to be Russian." 

After several hours of beating, intermittent interrogations and a broken jaw, Melnichuck was finally allowed to use a phone, so he could call his mother. Around 9 pm they let him go. 

When he stepped outside, he found himself in what appeared to be the headquarter of the border guards in Balaklava, a base of the Russian Black Sea Fleet—eight miles from Sevastopol. 

Two weeks later, he was still recovering from the injuries, eating through a straw (his jaw wouldn't open) and his spine and head would still hurt. The following week both of his parents were fired from a company they'd been employed by for over 30 years and his car was stolen. Melnichuk is currently trying to restart his life in Kiev, his family safely transplanted. 

“Now I can’t comeback to hometown,” he said. “But one day I will." 

Contact Staff Reporter Olga Grigoryants here.