Lubinets said how many civilian Ukrainians are in Russian prisons

This was announced by Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets after a meeting of the working group on the protection of the rights and freedoms of civilians.

According to him, the stay of almost 1,700 civilians in Russian prisons has now been officially established. Of these, 900 cases have been confirmed by the International Committee of the Red Cross.

However, about 14,000 civilians are officially registered in the status of missing persons," Lubinets said.

In addition, the issue of terminology regarding persons in captivity was raised during the meeting. The main problem is that the invaders qualify many civilian captives as prisoners of war, whereas according to Ukrainian legislation they remain civilian citizens.

The Strategic Plan of the Office of the Prosecutor General on countering violations of international humanitarian law related to the unlawful deprivation of liberty of civilians was also presented.

Its main goal is to ensure comprehensive, objective and impartial pre-trial investigation and prosecution of the crime of unlawful deprivation of liberty of civilians and to ensure access of victims of such crimes to effective remedies, - said the Ombudsman.

Earlier Socialportal wrote that according to the head of the Centre for Civil Liberties, only 160 civilian prisoners were returned from Russian captivity during two years.