Two Nottingham Lads: 1. From One Nottingham Man to Another

Donetsk, April 2022. Two men find themselves face to face in a prison building. One is a prisoner of war, captured fighting for Ukraine. The other is a self-styled independent journalist, filming an interview for his online audience.  But these two men are not Ukrainian. They’re British – and they were both born in Nottingham.

Graham Philips had been documenting the growing war in the East of Ukraine since 2014, amassing thousands of followers keen to see the war from what appears to be a pro-Russian viewpoint. Aiden Aslin had been fighting for Ukraine since 2018, but was captured not long after the full scale invasion. 

This episode begins with a disturbing video - a peculiar, chilling episode which will change the lives of both men forever - and introduces our two protagonists, charting their backstories to understand how they found themselves on opposite sides of a foreign war. What motivated them to go to Ukraine in the first place? And how did their worldviews change so dramatically, when they were born in the same city?

Presenter: Paul Kenyon

A Message Heard production for BBC Radio 4