Horrors of Ukraine war: Lid lifted on ‘torture hole’

Putin issued eerie ultimatum as Ukraine shows off military might

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The accusation made by Viktor Buchnev, a former adviser to the mayor of the town of Energodar in southern Ukraine, is the latest levelled against Moscow. Three Ukrainian soldiers fighting in Mariupol who were wounded and taken prisoner by Russian forces accused their captors of torture last month.

Mr Buchnev told Ukraine’s Public Radio there are a number of detention centres where people have been held and tortured.

He said: “The boys say those who were held at first were quite brutal militants. They beat them; kept 12 of them in cells three by six metres; did not let them sleep; poisoned them with gas canisters. People are simply mocked there.”

The former official continued: “People are kept, tortured, mocked and there are many such people. I think more than 30 to 50. Quite a large number of people are kept.”

It has not been possible to independently verify Mr Buchnev’s claims.

Amnesty International has described Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as an act of aggression which has unleashed the gravest human rights crisis in Europe since the Second World War.

Human Rights Watch said in July that Russian forces have tortured, unlawfully detained and forcibly disappeared civilians in the occupied areas of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, which is where Energodar lies.

Yulia Gorbunova, Senior Ukraine Researcher at Human Rights Watch, said: “Russian forces have turned occupied areas of southern Ukraine into an abyss of fear and wild lawlessness.

“Torture, inhumane treatment, as well as arbitrary detention and unlawful confinement of civilians, are among the apparent war crimes we have documented… Russian authorities need to end such abuses immediately and understand that they can, and will, be held accountable.”

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People interviewed by the organisation described being tortured, or witnessing torture, through beatings and in some cases electric shocks.

They described injuries including broken bones, severe burns, concussions, cuts and bruises.

The three Ukrainian soldiers, who were part of a force which spent weeks fighting from a vast steelworks in the southern port of Mariupol, told a news conference in Kyiv last month that their captors wanted to force them to confess to crimes against civilians.

The three had been exchanged for Russian prisoners of war.

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Vladyslav Zhaivoronok, who lost a leg, said: “I was interrogated even before I started receiving antibiotics after my limb was amputated.

“The guys who were there were tortured. Some had needles inserted into their wounds, some were tortured with water, some received inadequate treatment.”

Mr Zhaivoronok served with national guard unit, the Azov Regiment some members of which had far-right and ultranationalist origins.

After fighting for weeks from the bunkers and tunnels of the steelworks, hundreds of Azov steelworks fighters surrendered in May.

Russia’s supreme court ruled the regiment was a terrorist organisation.

Denys Chepurko said he had been held in a prison in the Russian-backed Donetsk People’s Republic in eastern Ukraine.

He said some prisoners had been forced to strip naked and squat.

Mr Chepurko said: “They wanted us to testify against our commanders, [to say] we had bombed the city, they wanted to shift the blame on us. I said I wouldn’t do it.”

“They started beating me with sticks. I didn’t sign anything.”

The third former prisoner, Dmytro Usychenko, said: “They threatened us with physical reprisals, shooting… They wanted us to confess that we killed civilians although we did no such thing.”

Under international law, prisoners of war must not be subjected to any form of torture or ill-treatment. They should also be allowed access to the International Committee of the Red Cross.

In July, footage emerged that reportedly showed Russian soldiers castrating a Ukrainian prisoner of war. The man appears gagged and with his hands tied behind his back in the video which, according to reports, was first posted on a pro-Russian Telegram page.

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