A Russian pilot who was missing presumed dead after his plane was shot down three decades ago during the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan has been found alive and wants to come home, according to a military veterans group. “He is still alive. It’s very astonishing. Now he needs help,” the head of the Russian paratroopers’ union, Valery Vostrotin, told RIA Novosti state news agency on Friday.
Vostrotin, who heads the Russian side of a Russian-US joint commission on prisoners of war and soldiers missing in action, declined to name the pilot for reasons of confidentiality. The man was shot down in 1987 and was likely now to be over 60, the deputy head of veteran’s organisation Battle Brotherhood, Vyacheslav Kalinin, told the news agency.
He suggested the pilot could be in Pakistan, where Afghanistan had camps for prisoners of war, and said he wanted to return home. RIA Novosti reported that 125 Soviet planes were shot down in Afghanistan during the course of the war between 1979 and 1989. When Soviet troops pulled out in 1989, about 300 soldiers were listed as missing. Since then, 30 have been found and most returned to their home countries.
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