Jailers and officials at Russia's 'torture prisons' in Ukraine exposed by

A significant story is unfolding on the international scene. Jailers and officials at Russia's 'torture prisons' in Ukraine exposed by BBCImage caption, "I have never heard such terrible screams before," says Liudmyla, recalling her first days in the Izolyatsia detention centreByBy Tania Kharchenko and Samuel HortiBBC Eye InvestigationsPublished4 minutes agoThis article contains accounts of torture and sexual violenceEarly one October morning in 2019, a group of men jumped out of a car and grabbed Liudmyla Huseinova as she left her home. The 64-year-old says they seized her bag and threw her into the back seat, beginning what she describes as a "nightmare" in Russia's secretive detention system in parts of Ukraine it had occupied since 2014: "For three years and 13 days of my life, my soul and body were crippled. "She says that among the men was Yurii Temerbek, a Ukrainian who had been a local traffic policeman and had joined the Russian-backed separatists.

Temerbek – a husband, father and grandfather, now aged 56 - was there again, two weeks later, she says, watching as a man with a Russian accent sexually assaulted her in a notorious detention centre. A World Service investigation has identified Temerbek, and uncovered details about two other men accused of abusing detainees, shedding light on a system that operates almost completely out of reach of Ukrainian and international justice. The men appear to now be living ordinary lives with their families in Russia and occupied Ukraine.

The Details

Survivors see revealing their identities as a step towards holding them accountable. Liudmyla says that if the men she accuses of abuse aren't found and imprisoned, "then, justice for me will be their names as criminals, and torturers, will be known to their children". ruImage caption, Temerbek, now aged 56, is pictured in a traffic police uniform in this image posted on social media in 2013The prisons these men helped run are part of a detention system in which the UN's human rights office (OHCHR) says the torture and ill-treatment of civilians is "systematic and widespread".

It says former detainees describe beatings, electric shocks, mock executions and sexual violence, with civilians often detained arbitrarily and families given little information. The Kremlin has accused the OHCHR of bias. In May this year, the UN added Russia to its blacklist of countries suspected of committing sexual violence in conflict zones - allegations Russia dismissed as "groundless lies".

Ukrainian authorities say more than 16,000 civilians have been taken captive or disappeared. Some of these cases followed Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 - others date back as far as 2014, when Russia annexed the southern Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and occupied parts of eastern Ukraine, triggering widespread international condemnation. At that time, Liudmyla was working as a safety engineer on a poultry farm in Novoazovsk, a city in the Donetsk region close to the border with Russia.

The story has become one of the most prominent items on the global agenda.