One by one, Evgeniy Moiseyev carefully pinned his military medals to his chest until they almost covered the front of his dark brown suit. It was an unusually hot day for the time of year, so the suit was something of a burden. But this was an important day for him.

Moiseyev is the chair of the local prisoner of war association in Rostov-on-Don, and he had come to a military base in this southern port city that was previously a Nazi-run POW camp. It was the international day marking the liberation of POWs from German-run concentration camps, and he was preparing to pay tribute to the thousands of Soviet prisoners who died here.

Moiseyev was himself a prisoner at the base, when he was just 15 years old, witnessing a catalogue of horrors, including mass starvation and even medical experiments on some of the Red Army soldiers held there.

Yet, as he made to go inside, the guards blocked his way.