On July 28, Ukraine commemorates the victims of Russian captivity and torture. According to the Office of the Prosecutor General, over 11,000 Ukrainian citizens have fallen victim to unlawful detention on temporarily occupied territories and in the Russian Federation, reports Baltimore Chronicle, with reference to Office of the Prosecutor General.
The investigation has revealed that more than 5,000 Ukrainian military personnel and over 5,600 civilians have been recognized as victims due to their captivity in Russian hands. The Prosecutor General’s Office reports that 534 individuals, suspected of involvement in torture, have been formally charged, and indictments have been submitted to court against 365 people. Notably, 117 individuals have already been sentenced.
On the temporarily occupied territories and in Russia, 176 permanent places of detention and over 120 temporary (transit) detention points have been identified. Detainees were systematically tortured: they were beaten, subjected to electric shocks, attacked by service dogs, strangled, hung, subjected to mock executions, and sexually assaulted. Instances of causing bodily harm, burns, and psychological abuse were also documented.
More than 45 employees of the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia are among the suspects, including directors of Russian prisons and detention centers in Kursk, Stary Oskol, and Pskov, as well as heads of facilities on the occupied territories, such as Suhodilska and Volnovakha prisons.
A particularly horrific case remains the mass killing of Ukrainian prisoners of war in the Olenivka prison. On the night of July 28-29, 2022, an explosion resulted in at least 50 deaths, while 140 others were injured. The prison authorities are accused of leaving the injured without medical assistance, which led to the deaths of an additional 9 Ukrainian soldiers, as stated by the Prosecutor General’s Office.
It is worth noting that the Ukrainian Parliament declared July 28 as a day of remembrance for the defenders and defenders of Ukraine, members of volunteer formations, as well as civilians who were tortured, executed, or died in captivity.
Earlier we wrote that martial law and mobilization in Ukraine extended for another 90 days.
