Ukrainian journalist Victoria Roshchyna, who was captured by Russia in August 2023, was subjected to severe torture while in detention, according to a new investigation by Slidstvo.Info.
The investigation revealed that Roshchyna suffered knife wounds and was tortured with electric shocks. Her weight dropped to around 30 kilograms during her captivity, according to the investigation.
Roshchyna, a freelance journalist who had previously worked with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) and other prominent Ukrainian media outlets, went missing on 3 August 2023 during a trip to Russian-occupied territories.
She planned to reach the occupied east of Ukraine via Poland and Russia in 3 days. In May 2024, Russia admitted, sending a letter of confirmation to her father, that it had detained Roshchyna. Ukrainian authorities confirmed on 10 October 2024 that Viktoria Roshchyna died in Russian custody.
“I saw several scars on her body – definitely on her arm and leg. She had a knife wound, a fresh scar. Between the wrist and elbow in the soft tissues. And the scar was about three centimeters,” Roshchyna’s cellmate from the Taganrog detention center recalled.
The cellmate, whose name was withheld for security reasons, also said that Roshchyna was tortured with electricity multiple times. “I know that [they tortured her] with electricity more than once. And she didn’t say how many times, but she said she was all blue,” the witness said, adding that the electric current may have been connected to Roshchyna’s ears.
Russian authorities held Roshchyna in prisons without bringing any charges against her, according to Iryna Didenko, senior prosecutor at the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine.
Slidstvo.Info discovered that Russians first captured Roshchyna and held her in torture chambers in the occupied territory of Zaporizhzhia Oblast before transferring her to Taganrog, a city in Russia’s Rostov Oblast.
According to the cellmate, Roshchyna was initially held in Enerhodar and then in Melitopol – unauthorized detention facilities established by Russians in occupied Ukrainian territories.
The journalist’s health deteriorated rapidly in detention. “She constantly asked for help. She was losing weight severely. Vika weighed up to 30 kilograms,” the cellmate testified.
“I helped her get up because she was in such a condition that she couldn’t even lift her head from the pillow. I would first lift her head, Vika would grab the bed handle, and only then could she get up,” the witness added.
The investigation also found that detention center staff deliberately hid Roshchyna during an inspection by the Russian ombudsman, moving her to a locked room on another floor.
Roshchyna was last seen on 8 September 2024, when she was taken from her cell to an unknown location. In October 2024, the Russian Ministry of Defense sent a letter to her father, Volodymyr Roshchyn, informing him that Victoria had died in captivity.
A marine named Inga Chekinda, who was previously held in the same Taganrog detention center, told journalists that Russians built a human-sized furnace there to interrogate Ukrainian prisoners. She also reported that guards brutally tortured women, beat them, and forced them into sexualized acts.
According to Prosecutor General Kostin, more than 3,800 civilian captives and 2,200 Ukrainian prisoners of war have been officially documented as victims of torture and inhumane treatment. However, Kostin states that the actual scale of torture may far exceed these figures.
Ukrainian POWs have reported enduring severe beatings, electric shocks, sleep deprivation, and dog attacks. Many have also suffered mock executions and death threats while being subjected to starvation and denied medical care and basic necessities.
“Up to 90% of all returned POWs stated they have been subject to torture in Russian prisons…This is a stark violation of the third Geneva Convention, of which Moscow is a signatory,” Kostin says.
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