World should force Russia to comply with Convention against Torture - Ukraine’s ombudsman

That’s according to Dmytro Lubinets, the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for human rights, who addressed the issue on Telegram, Ukrinform reports.

"The international community should increase pressure on the Russian Federation and force it to comply with its international legal obligations, including the Convention against Torture!" Lubinets wrote.

He recalled that on this day in 1984, the UN General Assembly adopted the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, which entered into force three years later.

According to him, the problem of torture is extremely relevant during the war Russia is waging against Ukraine as there are known facts where Ukrainian prisoners of war, civilians, in particular children and women, have been subjected to torture.

"We also have evidence of the abuse of Ukrainian political prisoners illegally enslaved by Russia. This is an unacceptable violation of human rights and the norms of international humanitarian law," the ombudsman emphasized.

As Ukrinform reported earlier, in September, the Prosecutor General of Ukraine Andriy Kostin, during a meeting with the UN special rapporteur on torture, Dr. Alice Jill Edwards, said about 90% of Ukrainian prisoners of war held by Russia had gone through the horrors of torture, rape, threats of sexual violence, or other forms of ill-treatment.