Danielle Bell, head of the UN rights office team in Ukraine, told reporters in Geneva the cases documented were “just a fraction of the reality”, given that UN investigators were only able to talk to around 10 percent of prisonerss released by both sides and could not access regions of Ukraine controlled by Russian forces.
“Most of the victims of sexual violence were men, particularly in places of detention but women and children were also affected, primarily in occupied territory of Ukraine,” the report said.
“The violations committed include gang rape, rape, genital mutilation, electric shocks and beatings to the genitals, and other degrading acts of a sexual nature.”
The youngest rape survivor the UN documented was a four-year-old-girl and the oldest an 82-year-old woman. It blamed both cases on Russian authorities.
Almost half the violations attributed to Ukrainians against Russians and other foreign POWs also “comprised threats of sexual violence”, the UN said.
Turk urged Russia to withdraw its military forces from Ukraine, in line with “binding international law”.
