Moscow's “torture chambers” in Ukraine are paid for by Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Kremlin chiefs as part of a plan to obliterate his neighbour’s identity, investigators say.
Shocking evidence of at least 20 rooms for abuse in Kherson and interviews with 1,000 victims have delivered a damning dossier on Kremlin atrocities.
Teachers, journalists, local officials and members of the public were subjected to waterboarding, electrocution and vicious beatings to wipe out support for Ukraine.
More horror sites of torture exist in Ukraine and have been “funded by Putin’s credit card,” according to war-crimes lawyers.
As many as 400 people have disappeared from Kherson’s torture chambers, either murdered or taken to Russia, a new report claims.
British human rights lawyer Wayne Jordash, who leads the Mobile Justice Team in assisting Ukraine’s atrocity investigators from The Hague, says: “Putin’s plan is to occupy Ukraine, subjugate the Ukrainian population to Russian rule and destroy Ukraine identity.
“This plan is becoming clearer as the evidence from Kherson speaks to a wider, inherently criminal plan on the part of the Kremlin.”
Mr Jordash, KC, adds: “The mass torture chambers, financed by the Russian State are not random but rather part of a carefully thought out and financed blueprint with a clear objective to eliminate Ukrainian Ukrainian national and cultural identity.
“The torture centres are the tip of the iceberg in Russia’s inherently criminal plan to subjugate or destroy Ukrainians.
“They are designed to eliminate and destroy large parts of the Ukrainian population in order to enable the remainder to be enslaved.
“This is yet more evidence of genocidal tactics baked into Putin’s plan to extinguish Ukrainian identity in the areas under Russian occupation.”
The Mobile Justice Team - which deploys all over Ukraine to compile evidence of Russian atrocities - has revealed the chambers were run by Russian security agencies including the Russian Federal Security Services, the FSB.
Global Rights Compliance is an international human rights law firm who established the Mobile Justice Team.
Financial records linking the torture centres and the Russian State have also been uncovered by Ukraine’s Office of the Prosecutor General.
One was uncovered in the basement of an office block and another in a ‘ready-made’ former pre-trial detention facility.
Tyres were burnt in the buildings to cover up evidence of what had taken place but some prisoner graffiti remained.
Wayne Jordash added: “The evidence of Russia’s war crimes is growing exponentially and becoming more complex as time goes on.
“The Mobile Justice Team is working round the clock with Ukraine’s Office of the Prosecutor General to ensure these crimes are documented and investigated as thoroughly as possible.
“This is with maximum integrity so that we can create a bedrock of truth and a historical record which can be used both to counter Russia’s misinformation and to find justice for Ukraine’s victims.”
