NewsEuropeHRW accuses Russia of forced disappearances of Ukrainian civilians

HRW accuses Russia of forced disappearances of Ukrainian civilians

FILE – Elderly women wait in an ambulance before boarding a train evacuating civilians to Dnipro from Pokrovske, a small town in the eastern region of Donetsk. – Rick Mave/SOPA Images via ZUMA P / DPA – File

The NGO Human Right Watch (HRW) assured this Thursday that Russian troops in Ukraine would have made civilians disappear and would have forcibly and illegally transferred them to Russia.

Specifically, the organization has documented the arrest of nine civilians by Russian forces while they occupied the Ukrainian region of kyiv for their subsequent transfer to detention centers in the Russian regions of Kursk and Bryansk, both on the border with Ukraine.

“Russian forces have illegally transferred these civilians to Russia, subjected them to enforced disappearance and continue to hold them without providing information or access to their families,” said the NGO’s director for Europe and Central Asia, Tanya Lokshina.

“The Russian authorities must immediately release and return all Ukrainian civilians detained in Russia and ensure that all persons in their custody who have been detained in or from Ukraine, combatants or civilians, are officially registered with the International Committee for Red Cross (ICRC),” Lokshina demanded, arguing that civilians cannot be treated as prisoners of war.

HRW has underlined that Russian violations committed against detainees include possible illegal detention and hostage-taking, illegal transfer or deportation, and enforced disappearances, which may amount to or involve multiple war crimes.

The United Nations Human Rights Monitoring Mission (OHCHR) in Ukraine detailed in a report published in June that it had documented hundreds of cases of arbitrary detention by Russian forces in areas they, or affiliated armed groups, control. in Ukraine.

The report also detailed that many of the detainees had been subjected to torture and other ill-treatment and that “an undetermined number of victims were transferred to Russian territory”, among other places, where they were “held in penal institutions, often together with with prisoners of war.

The UN document also describes “credible reports of torture and other forms of inhumane treatment of prisoners of war interned both on the territory of the Russian Federation and on territory controlled by armed groups affiliated with Russia.

On the other hand, the Ukrainian NGO Media Initiative for Human Rights (MIHR) has assured HRW that some of the detainees were transferred to a camp in Naroulia, eastern Belarus, and between 3 and 10 days later, they were taken back to Russia.

“Ukrainian civilians detained by Russian forces not only lose their freedom, but also face serious risk to their health and life by being detained without legal or public supervision,” Lokshina said.

In addition, he has called on Russia to “immediately” reveal the whereabouts of the detainees, and to release all Ukrainian civilians in its custody, detained in previously or currently occupied areas.

Source: Europa Press

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