On 26 June, the International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, Ukraine, together with the international community, honours the memory, resilience and dignity of all those who have survived torture and other forms of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment.

For Ukraine, this day has held a special and painful significance for over twelve years. Since the start of the Russian Federation’s aggression in 2014 - from the illegal occupation of Crimea and parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions to the full-scale armed invasion in 2022 and beyond - torture has become part of the Kremlin regime’s criminal policy against the Ukrainian people.

Thousands upon thousands of Ukrainians - prisoners of war, civilians, journalists, activists, local government officials and religious figures - have passed through the torture chambers of Crimea, the temporarily occupied areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, and subsequently other occupied territories and places of detention within Russia.

In every village or town in Ukraine liberated from Russian occupation, more and more horrific evidence of Russian crimes has come to light.

Ukrainian investigative authorities and international monitoring mechanisms of the UN, the OSCE and the Council of Europe operating in Ukraine are documenting these crimes and are unequivocal in their assessments: the Russian authorities are systematically torturing Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war, which constitutes a coordinated policy and amounts to war crimes and crimes against humanity.

According to international monitoring missions, over 95 per cent of Ukrainian prisoners of war released from Russian captivity, as well as thousands of unlawfully detained civilian hostages, have been subjected to brutal torture, psychological and sexual violence.

Russia cynically disregards its obligations under international humanitarian law and denies international observers access to hundreds of detention facilities on its territory and in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, where Ukrainians are being held. A particularly egregious manifestation of inhumanity is the complete legal powerlessness of civilian hostages, whose detention Moscow conceals by committing the crime of enforced disappearance. Every documented instance of these atrocities constitutes irrefutable evidence of crimes against humanity.

Of particular concern is the fact that children are also suffering from torture, sexual violence and other grave violations. An independent UN international commission has documented that children have been victims of the full spectrum of violations, including indiscriminate attacks, torture and rape, with foreseeable psychological consequences.

Twelve years of impunity have only exacerbated the scale of these crimes. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine once again calls on the international community to step up sanctions and political pressure on the Russian Federation and those involved in torture, regardless of when the crimes were committed - from 2014 to the present day; to demand that international monitoring mechanisms and the International Committee of the Red Cross be granted full access to places of detention where Ukrainian citizens are being held.

Impunity breeds new crimes. Only through justice, documentation and accountability can we put a stop to this practice and prevent its recurrence. Ukraine, together with its international partners, will make every effort to ensure that the highest political and military leadership of the Russian Federation, as well as the direct perpetrators, are held accountable under international law and face inevitable punishment.

Together with its partners, Ukraine is working to develop international instruments to strengthen law enforcement, accountability and the prevention of violations of international humanitarian law and human rights.