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Taxi Driver Who Shamed Passengers With Soviet Dye Tastes His Own Medicine

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A taxi driver in the Far East city of Khabarovsk who forced two young women who couldn’t pay their fare to smear a green antiseptic on their faces has reportedly become a target himself.

A video doing the rounds on Russian social media on Tuesday shows a man with a close-cropped haircut washing his face and neck with zelyonka, a green Soviet-era antiseptic used to treat cuts, then kneeling down and spitting on the ground. 

The person filming the footage accuses him and other drivers of “acting like animals.”

The man looks similar to the driver who was filmed forcing two young women to rub their faces with zelyonka, a Soviet-era caustic antiseptic, after they were unable to pay for their rides.

The footage caused an uproar and the driver has reportedly been fired. 

The state-run RIA Novosti news agency cited a local Interior Ministry spokesman as saying the driver told police he hadn’t pressured his passengers into painting their faces with zelyonka, but that he had proposed it “as an alternative to not paying for their rides, and they agreed." 

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