From the outside it looks like an ordinary army unit.

The only things that give it away are the barbed wire and armed guards in watchtowers.

This is the 28th Disciplinary Battalion near Moscow.

Work detail starts early

"Convicts used to come here from remand centres, with all sorts of romantic ideas about a criminal fraternity," the camp's commander, Major Sergey Luzin, told Russian NTV.

"We have built a system which breaks down all their impressions and romanticism within two to three days of arriving."

In the evenings it hurts - you think about going home

Inmate

The camp houses some 600 soldiers at any one time. Some are here for desertion, some for bullying fellow conscripts.

Others could not take the bullying and absconded, sometimes ending up in the same disciplinary unit as their bully.

Just a number

The day starts early with strict inspection. The soldiers are then sent on work detail - sawing tree-trunks, making metal coat hangers, repairing the drill square.

Hard work and discipline

"The more you work, the more you forget where you are, the quicker time passes, and the less you are able think about where you are," one said.

"You just think about one thing - getting it over with quicker.

"In the evenings, of course, it hurts, you think about going home, going home, going home. The more you think about home, the more you want to go there."

All movement within the grounds of the disciplinary unit must be in goose-step, as strict military discipline and drill are the main means of correction.

20 days in solitary for answering back

"It is practically impossible to get out of here," a guard explained, "and when you take away someone's freedom of movement, it hits them hard. They are broken here. You can break anybody with the rules."

Roman has just arrived to serve an 18th-month sentence for desertion.

"Your number is 53," a warrant officer tells him.

"Everything numbered 53 is yours. Bed 53. Locker 53. Stool 53. If it has the number 53 on it, it's yours."

Inhumane

Those who break the internal rules of the disciplinary battalion are put in solitary confinement in the guardroom, where it is almost dark, airless and damp.

"They used to have facilities like this in army units," the TV's correspondent explains, "but they have recently been banned as inhumane."

Convicts must march in goose-step

Yury, serving 10 months in the disciplinary battalion for desertion, is spending 30 days in the guardroom for drinking beer his mother brought him on a visit.

Another, sentenced for extorting money from conscripts, is spending 20 days in the guardhouse for answering back to a sergeant.

The guards are not allowed to associate with the convicts. If they strike up a friendship, the guards would not be able to fire on convicts if they tried to escape. If the guards did not fire, they themselves would be court-martialled.

A guard explains he must warn would-be escapers three times to halt, and fire into the air.

"If he still does not obey the order, I open fire on him, but not to kill," he says. "I'd try to wound him, after all, they're not animals."

BBC Monitoring, based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.