Ukrainian journalist’s body is returned home from Russia ‘without eyes or a brain’ in a bag labelled ‘unidentified male’

The body of a Ukrainian journalist was returned home from captivity without her eyes or brain, according to an international investigation.

Viktoria Roshchyna’s body was returned to Kyiv in February after she disappeared into an unofficial detention centre in Rostov, Russia, in August 2023.

But her corpse was handed back as that of an unidentified male as part of an exchange with Russia, until DNA tests revealed it belonged to the missing journalist.

When forensic experts opened up the body bag, they discovered the body had been tortured and mutilated. Her eyeballs, brain and part of her throat were removed.

Her head was shaved and her neck was bruised, and attached to her shin was a tag with her last name. Her feet were also covered in burn marks, according to officials familiar with an ongoing investigation by the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office.

Medical examiners later found Roshchyna had a broken rib and possible traces of electric shock. Ukrainian authorities only revealed that her body had been repatriated on April 24.

A DNA test confirmed that the body belonged to the 27-year-old journalist who had vanished into the brutal Russian prison system after being detained while reporting on claims that Russia was operating a network of unofficial detention centers in August 2023.

Roshchyna is the first Ukrainian journalist to die in Russian captivity, and was first reported dead on October 2. But her father, Volodymyr Roshchyn, clung to the hopes that she was still alive until her body was returned and eventually identified.

Viktoria Roshchyna’s body was returned to Kyiv in February after she disappeared into an unofficial detention centre in occupied Ukraine in August 2023

The young journalist spent the majority of her time in detention at the Taganrog SIZO-2 prison in Rostov, which is also known as Russia’s Guantanamo

Colleagues of Ukrainian journalist Victoria Roshchyna hold photographs of her during an event in honor of her memory at a makeshift memorial for fallen Ukrainian soldiers at Independence Square in Kyiv, on October 11, 2024

The young journalist spent the majority of her time in detention at the Taganrog SIZO-2 prison in Rostov, which is also known as Russia’s Guantanamo after the United States military prison – Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

An investigation into her death revealed that the reporter was held incommunicado during her captivity in Russia, a serious human rights violation according to international law.

According to the report, after initially being held in the cities of Enerhodar and Melitopol, Roshchyna was transferred to the Taganrog detention centre run by Russia’s Federal Security Service in a critical condition.

But she reportedly told one cell mate that she had refused a deal offered by a serviceman transporting her because ‘she always stuck to her principles’. 

On October 10, Roshchyna’s father received a letter from Russia announcing her death, though it failed to clarify the circumstances of her passing.

The UN said Russia’s treatment of detainees is ‘disturbing and the scale is extreme.’

‘I have documented serious cases of torture, including mock executions, all types of beatings, electricity being applied to ears and genitals and other parts of the body, waterboarding, as well as threats and actual rapes and sexual violence,’ said Alice Edwards, the UN’s special rapporteur on torture told the Washington Post.

According to a digital reconstruction of the prison as per released prisoners’ recollections, two buildings within the Taganrog SIZO-2 are used as torture chambers dedicated to beatings, near-drownings and electrocutions.

The Washington Post explained that Roshchyna was likely held in a 10ft-by-16ft cell with two to four other prisoners and subjected to daily abuse.

Speaking to the newspaper, which was involved in the investigation into Roshchyna’s death, a woman who was detained where the journalist was likely held said inmates were barred from laughing and cockroaches were often found in their meals.

Former inmates also described the constant surveillance within the cellblock and revealed that twice a day, prisoners were forced to stand facing the corridor wall with their legs spread while guards beat them from behind. 

After initially being held in the cities of Enerhodar and Melitopol, Roshchyna was transferred to the Taganrog detention centre run by Russia’s Federal Security Service in a critical condition

When forensic experts opened up the body bag, they discovered Roshchyna’s body had been tortured and mutilated. Her eyeballs, brain and part of her throat were removed

The brutal Taganrog SIZO-2 prison is located in Rostov, Russia

Detainees who resisted were dragged away to receive additional abuse, including getting beaten while suspended from bars on walls.

Speaking to ForbiddenStories, one prisoner of war detained in Taganrog said: ‘There’s another room where we were hanged for 10 to 15 minutes. You’re hanging, and you’re being hit on five points. You can’t do anything, your arms are in handcuffs; and your legs, you also can’t [move them]’. 

Another recalled: ‘They could hit you with a board on your fingers. They could drown you. I was personally put in an electric chair twice with a voltage of 380 volts, with a device that attached clamps between my toes. [They] turned on the current, after [dousing] me in water’.

In June, Roshchyna went on hunger strike, according to a former detainee’s deposition to Ukrainian prosecutors.

She was sent a month later to an off-site hospital after her weight decreased and her physical health deteriorated at a worrying pace.

Upon her arrival back to the prison, she was thrown into a separate cell, where other inmates recalled her being too weak to respond to yelling guards – as she normally would have.

By the end of August, Roshchyna’s father received a four-minute phone call from his daughter where Russian guards told him to convince his daughter to eat ‘so that she would not starve’.

The prisoner was reportedly removed from her cell on September 8 in what a former cellmate assumed was preparation for release.

But on October 10, Roshchyna’s father received a letter from the Russian authorities stating that his daughter was dead. He refused to believe the news.

He sent inquiries to Russian authorities, requesting investigations into where her body was located and when it would be returned. In form letters, his requests were denied. 

Prosecutors in Kyiv are now investigating Roshchyna’s death as a war crime.

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Read more at DailyMail.co.uk