24/04/2022 16:14

Commissioner: Russia holds Ukrainian prisoners of war in general regime colonies

In violation of the 1949 Geneva Convention, the occupying country held captive Ukrainian soldiers in general regime colonies without converting prisons to POW camps.

 Prisoners of war of the Armed Forces of Ukraine are in colonies of the general regime in the Rostov region of the Russian Federation.  To do this, the occupiers resettled two penitentiaries in the south of Russia at once: a general regime colony № 1 in the town of Zverevo, and № 12 in Kamensk-Shakhtinsky near the Russian-Ukrainian border.

 One and a half months ago, detainees were evicted from there to the Rostov-on-Don colony № 10, where prisoners now sleep in three shifts.  And the institutions in Kamensk-Shakhtinsky and Zverevo are now being filled at the expense of captured Ukrainian soldiers.  They are guarded by employees of the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia and prisoners left for auxiliary work.

 The rules of treatment of prisoners are regulated by the Convention on the Treatment of Prisoners of War and its Additional Protocols, adopted in 1977 and 2005.  Russia denounced Protocols 1 and 2 to this convention in 2019, but the occupying country is nevertheless obliged to comply with the principles set out in the text of the 1949 Convention relating to the Treatment of Prisoners of War.

 According to the Convention, prisoners of war captured in a combat zone must be evacuated as soon as possible to camps located at a sufficient distance from the danger zone.  Conditions in these camps must be no less favorable than those enjoyed by the captive troops stationed in the same area.

 I appeal to the UN Commission for Investigation Human Rights Violations during the Russian Military Invasion of Ukraine, to take into account these facts of violations of the rights of Russian citizens of Ukraine.