The body of a Ukrainian journalist detained by Russia earlier in the war was finally returned, but with her eye and brain missing after suffering horrific torture at the hands of the Kremlin.
Viktoria Roshchyna, 27, was taken as a prisoner of war in 2023 after heading inside Ukraine’s occupied territories on a reporting mission. She vanished into Russia’s hellish penal system and her severely emaciated body has now been finally returned to Ukraine. The body bag she was sent home in marked the corpse as an “unidentified male” before DNA tests finally proved the remains – missing her eye, part of her larynx and brain – were Viktoria.
Investigators believe the organs were removed in an attempt by the Russians to hide the torture she suffered at their hands. They also found burn marks on her feet, likely traces of electric shock, and a broken rib.
An expert told news outlet Important Stories: “The larynx can be important evidence in cases of strangulation. When a person is strangled, the hyoid bone [in the neck] is often broken. Haemorrhages can be found in the whites of the eyes, and oxygen deprivation can be detected in the brain.”
Former POWs held with Roshchyna – who worked for digital media Hromadske TV and other outlets – said she was detained in Energodar in the summer of 2023. She was later transported to Melitopol, where she was held captive for four months and subjected to torture.
From here, she went to Taganrog’s SIZO-2 – likened to a concentration camp – in a critical condition. She had fevers, her menstruation stopped, and she suffered from abdominal pain.
Yet she is reported to have defied her captors, telling guards: “You are occupiers, you came to our country, you kill our people… I will never cooperate with you.” A former inmate said: “Even the word ‘concentration camp’ would be too mild for SIZO-2.”
The prison earned a reputation early in the occupation for torture, with beatings a daily happening. Inmates were made to admit war crimes during torture sessions and were denied access to lawyers or human rights activists.
Among the inmates are soldiers who refused to take part in notorious Russian “meat-grinder” assaults on the frontline. Others are held because they had tried to escape, or for other supposed transgressions.
Horrific acts of torture have been reported from prisoner of war camps in Russia where captured Ukrainian soldiers are fed dog food and suffer sickening cruelty. Inmate Oleksiy Kretsu revealed he had witnessed the torture of two prisoners whose genitals were stunned.
He said: “There were women in their bathhouse. And they loved to beat us in the genitals with boots, stun guns, anything. They also beat us during interrogations.
“I’m just a simple border guard, not an assault trooper, not a marine, not a machine gunner. I lost half of my teeth during these interrogations.”
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