Ukraine announced the deaths of more than 200 prisoners of war in Russia

Of the more than 5,000 military prisoners that Russia returned to Ukraine, at least 206 died in captivity, writes Associated Press with reference to the data of the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office. Violence in Russian prisons was probably one of the factors that contributed to a large number of prisoners of war deaths, representatives of human rights groups, the UN, and the Ukrainian government and conducting the autopsy of the tsaria of prisoners of war Ukrainian forensic expert said.

Details. Of the 206, in the prisoner of Ukrainian prisoners of war, more than 50 died during a missile strike on a colony in Elena in the summer of 2022, which, according to the conclusions of the UN monitoring mission in Ukraine, was applied by Russia.

• Another 245 military Armed Forces were killed by the Russian military immediately after surrendering, it follows from the data of Ukrainian prosecutors.

• AP interviewed relatives of 21 Ukrainian prisoners of war, who died in captivity. The autopsy in Ukraine showed that five died of heart failure, including soldiers aged 22, 39 and 43 years. Four others died of tuberculosis or pneumonia, and one at a time died of infection, asphyxiation and a stupid head injury.

• One of the prisoners of war was tortured with electric shock and was beaten just a few days before death from heart failure and extreme exhaustion, it follows from the report of the forensic experts, which studied AP. Other openings showed that signs of gangrene or absurd infections were found on the bodies, the agency writes.

• The number of dead in prisons is added by another evidence that Russia systematically brutally treats prisoners, writes AP.

• It is expected that the number of dead prisoners of war will grow as the bodies return and identify. Moreover, in some cases, it is extremely difficult to determine the causes of death, since the returned military people sometimes do not have internal organs, and in some cases, bruises and injuries are hidden, the publication says. The poor condition of the returned bodies also prevents him from understanding whether the prisoners were subjected to torture, hunger and poor medical care, Ukrainian officials say. “They keep the bodies until they reach a state when nothing can be determined,” said Peter Yatsenko, a representative of the Ukrainian Coordinating headquarters on the treatment of prisoners of war.

• The Russian authorities did not respond to a request for a comment. Earlier, Moscow accused Kyiv of cruelty with Russian prisoners of war, AP recalls. The UN confirmed that cases of violence in Ukrainian captivity took place, but noted that violations from Ukraine are much less common and serious than those that they accuse Russia.

Context. In 2024, the UN said that 95% of the liberated Ukrainian prisoners of war were concluded in the conclusion of "systematic" torture. They talked about beatings, electric shock, strangulation, sexual violence, long -term stay in stress poses, imitation of execution and deprivation of sleep.

• The report also stated that some Russian prisoners of war were also subjected to beatings, exposure to electric shock and threats by the military of the Armed Forces of Ukraine immediately after capture. But violence ceased immediately after the transfer of Russian prisoners of war to official Ukrainian centers of detention, the report said.