Occupants abducted almost 400 people in the TOT of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions

During the full-scale Russian-Ukrainian war, at least 395 people have been abducted in the newly occupied territories of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions, 103 of whom are representatives of the Crimean Tatar people.

According to the Crimean Tatar Resource Center (CTRC), they have been systematically monitoring human rights violations in the occupied Crimea since the beginning of their activities, and with the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, they also began to do so in the newly occupied territories of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions. Every quarter, the CTRC presents an analysis of human rights violations in these territories.

"Thanks to the timely response, the CTRC learned about the fate of about 80 people who were abducted in these territories. Some of them were either released or placed in Russian detention centers," the statement said.

The CTRC also emphasized that in the newly occupied territories of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions, Russians are not guided by any legislation and openly commit war crimes, including enforced disappearances, illegal home invasions, torture and murder.

In the summer, the occupiers in Kherson region kidnapped Zhanna Kyselova, the editor of a local newspaper, from her apartment in the temporarily occupied Kakhovka for the second time. For the first time, Russian security forces took the woman in September 2022 and "kept her in the basement for almost a month." It is still unknown where she is being held now.

According to the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, at least 177 Ukrainian prisoners have been killed in Russian captivity since the Kremlin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. According to Victoria Tsymbalyuk, a representative of the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, the more time prisoners spend in Russian prisons, the closer they are to death. She also noted that due to the lack of international control, the actual number of deaths in Russian prisons is likely to be much higher.

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