After de-occupation, 28 torture centres were discovered in Kharkiv region

This was told by the head of the investigation department of the Main Department of the National Police in Kharkiv Region, Serhiy Bolvinov, during a press conference "Persecution and torture of civilians in Kharkiv Region", the press service of the National Police of Ukraine has reported.

Now this is the largest number of torture rooms that have been discovered in Ukraine.

Now in the Kharkiv region investigators of the National police investigate 10 criminal proceedings in relation to torture, during which they work with 227 victims. The biggest is the case of torture rooms in the city of Kupyansk, in which 73 offences are being investigated.

Here (in the torture room in Kupyansk - ed.) the military of the Russian army, illegal armed formations "lnr/dnr" and collaborators illegally detained and tortured local residents in the temporary detention centre of the Kupyansk police department for more than six months," the police said.

According to official data, 67 victims were recorded in the Kupyansk torture room. But the police know that more than 150 people aged from 16 to 65 suffered from the torture of the occupants there. Some of them could be kept for more than 100 days. The victims include schoolchildren, pensioners, teachers, directors of local businesses and farmers.

The victims said that the payback beat them with hands, feet, rubber sticks and pipes, electric current and stun gun. They also scorched plastic on their bodies, bent their hands and joints in handcuffs, forced them to work, and exerted psychological pressure.

As a result, two of the captives died, four are missing, and four more are still in captivity. Most of them have suffered severe psychological trauma. Investigators of the specialised war crimes investigation department are working with them," the report said.

The police have collected enough evidence on the Kupyansk torture room, but it is necessary to identify all the perpetrators. Soon, according to Serhiy Bolvinov, law enforcers will announce a series of suspects involved in the torture of Ukrainians in Kupyansk.