Foreign
FORMER Ukrainian detainees and government officials have accused Russia of systematically torturing prisoners of war and civilian detainees, alleging widespread beatings, electric shocks and sexual abuse in detention facilities.
The allegations were made during an informal meeting of the United Nations Security Council, where Ukrainian representatives said thousands of Ukrainians remained in Russian captivity.
Russia rejected the claims, with its Deputy U.N. Representative, Maria Zabolotskaya, describing them as “a disinformation campaign.”
Zabolotskaya, in turn, alleged that Russian prisoners held by Ukraine were subjected to “torture and degradation and moral and physical abuse.”
Khuan Alberto Garsiya, a serving member of the Ukrainian military, told the meeting that he endured severe mistreatment during 1,183 days in Russian captivity.
“Yes … I was tortured,” Garsiya told reporters after the meeting. “Anything you can think of that can be done hurtful, humiliating to a man, unwillingly.
“Anything that comes to your mind, not only verbal, physical abuse, daily beatings, electrocution, excessive, excessive exercises in freezing cold when it’s minus degrees … sexual abuse.
“Everything that can be applied to a person into making a person break mentally. It was all applied to me and most of my comrades,” he said.
Garsiya said he survived the ordeal but alleged that two of his friends were beaten to death in detention centres in Ukraine’s Donetsk region.
According to him, prisoners were held in overcrowded barracks with inadequate conditions, where many suffered from dysentery and severe food shortages.
The soldier, whose father is Cuban, said he was specifically targeted because of his Latino name and accused of being “a mercenary and an American spy.”
Crimean Tatar activist Leniie Umerova, who was released in a prisoner exchange in 2024, said she was detained while attempting to visit her seriously ill father in Crimea.
Umerova said she was transferred through “seven detention facilities” in what she described as “a carousel of repression” and accused Russia of using torture against Ukrainians in captivity.
Also speaking, Oleg Gushin of the Ukrainian government’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War alleged that Ukrainian detainees were routinely “killed and tortured.”
Gushin said Kyiv had identified “more than 300 places of detention” in Russia and Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories.
He added that although more than 9,000 Ukrainians had been returned through prisoner exchanges, “thousands” remained in Russian captivity.
Ukraine’s Chargé d’Affaires to the United Nations, Volodymyr Pavlichenko, called for increased international pressure and accountability over Russia’s treatment of prisoners and civilian detainees.(Reuters/NAN)
A.I
Aug. 11, 2026
Tags: Khuan Alberto Garsiya Maria Zabolotskaya