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Ukraine is working to free all its military and civilians, adults and children, from Russian captivity and has already returned 3,310 prisoners of war home in 53 exchanges.
This was announced by President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
“We continue to work and look for ways to release everyone from Russian captivity – all our military and civilians, adults and children. I thank everyone who helps,” Zelenskyy wrote.
As The Gaze previously reported, almost 90% of Ukrainian prisoners of war were tortured, raped, threatened with sexual violence or other forms of ill-treatment while in Russian captivity. This was stated by Prosecutor General of Ukraine Andriy Kostin during a meeting with the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, Alice Jill Edwards.
“In all the liberated territories, we find evidence of these horrors. In the Kherson region alone, 11 torture chambers have been discovered. In Kharkiv region, almost 100 cases of torture involving more than 700 victims are being investigated. We observe similar things in other reoccupied territories,” said the Prosecutor General of Ukraine.
He also said that 156 Russian servicemen and representatives of the occupation authorities involved in the torture of Ukrainian prisoners of war and civilians had been identified. Andriy Kostin stressed that Russia has created a complex system of torture and ill-treatment in the occupied territories, aimed at both prisoners of war and civilian Ukrainians.
The UN also confirmed the facts of torture of Ukrainian prisoners of war. This was reported by the head of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, Danielle Bell.
For the first time in history, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) found Russia guilty of human rights violations in occupied Crimea and issued a judgement on the merits in the first interstate case Ukraine v. Russia (regarding Crimea), finding the aggressor state guilty of systematic human rights violations on the occupied Ukrainian peninsula.
Read also: US administration: New announcements on F-16s for Ukraine should be expected next week
