Russia returns body of abducted Ukrainian journalist Victoria Roshchyna with scars from torture
Victoria Roshchyna’s body has been returned to Ukraine six months after the 27-year-old Ukrainian journalist died while illegally held captive in Russia. Fears that Russia was avoiding handing the young woman’s body over because this would prove her ill-treatment have, unfortunately, proven well-founded. Ukraine’s Prosecutor General stated on 24 April that the cause of death had not been possible to ascertain but confirmed that she had been subjected to torture.
Victoria’s body was returned as part of an exchange at the end of February, however no information was revealed until DNA tests had been carried out. Ukrainian MP Yaroslav Yurchyshyn explained on 24 April that such secrecy had been required as the Russians often switch bodies. He added that in view of the torture and state of Victoria’s body, her family had asked for two DNA tests. He believes that one of these was carried out abroad.
Later on Thursday, Yury Bielousov, Head of Ukraine’s War Department within the Prosecutor General’s Office, held a press briefing on the results of their probe into the illegal imprisonment and death of Victoria Roshchyna. The Prosecutor General’s Office had launched a war crimes investigation under Article 438 of Ukraine’s criminal code soon after the news emerged on 10 October 2024 that Victoria had died in Russian captivity. Although the Russians had, in response to a formal request for information from Victoria’s father, reported that she “had died” on 19 September 2024, without providing any explanation, her body was only returned on 25 February 2025.
The DNA tests established with near certainty that the body returned was that of Victoria Roshchyna, however Bielousov explained that the condition of the body made it impossible at the level of the first forensic examination to determine the cause of death. Samples have been taken, and arrangements are now underway to work together with French forensic experts in carrying out a further forensic examination in order to understand how the young women died.
Bielousov did, however, confirm that numerous marks from torture and ill-treatment were found on Victoria’s body. These included bruises and bleeding on various parts of her body, as well as broken ribs.
Such findings are not unexpected. In March 2025, Ukrainian investigative journalists from Slidstvo.info, Suspilne and Graty, together with the international NGO Reporters without Borders, presented the results of their independent investigation into how Victoria had ended up in Russian captivity and about Russia’s treatment of her, especially in the SIZO-2 remand prison in Taganrog. Although within months of Victoria’s death, reports began emerging that Russia had escalated torture in other SIZO, rather than that in Taganrog, at the time the prison was especially notorious for its torture of Ukrainian hostages. The journalists had spoken with people whom Victoria had been in contact with just prior to her abduction and were also given access to part of the testimony of Victoria’s former cellmate, given after the latter was freed. She described the torture to which Victoria had been subjected and her state of extreme emaciation. The woman recalled that Roshchyna had numerous scars on her body from her treatment in the Russian torture prisons. The scars on her arms and legs included one caused by a knife. The former cellmate also confirmed that Victoria had been subjected to torture through electric currents with wires attached to the most sensitive parts of the body. Some of the wounds were very recent, and she clearly needed treatment for them, yet all her requests then, and on other occasions, were ignored.
It seems clear from her account that measures were taken to specifically hide the young journalist. Before a visit to the SIZO by people from ombudswoman Tatyana Moskalkova’s office, Roshchyna was taken away and kept locked in an office that was not part of the official visit. The latter was a cynical farce with the monitors videoed as they asked the hostages if they would like to send their families any letters. The woman giving testimony said immediately that she would like to write such a letter, however the ombudsperson’s representatives left, and no paper or pens were provided.
Victoria’s extreme weight loss appears to have been as a result of the torture and the psychological pressure she endured. Aside from visiting her once, the SIZO management did nothing until June 2025 when Victoria was placed in hospital, seemingly for two or three weeks. At that stage, the cellmate says, her weight had fallen dramatically. She weighed around 30 kilograms and couldn’t stand without the cellmate’s help. It is not clear what they did in the hospital as when they brought her back to the SIZO, they placed her in a cell by herself. The former cellmate says that they simply heard her returning, but adds that, whereas she had been taken to the hospital on a stretcher, it sounded as though she was able to move about. The former cellmate recalls hearing the guards telling Victoria to come out where they could see her and eat. Reporters without borders has spoken of several corroborating reports, suggesting that after the hospital, she did appear a bit better.
Victoria Roshchyna was held in solitary confinement from then on. She was last seen alive on 8 September 2024. The terse note that her father received in early October 2024 stated that the journalist had died on 19 September 2024. She was supposed to have been included in a prisoner exchange.
Victoria Roshchyna had already been abducted by the Russian invaders once, from occupied Berdiansk in March 2022, just after she wrote a report for Hromadske on the situation in occupied Enerhodar. On that occasion, she was held for ten days and released on 22 March 2022.
From then on, she worked freelance, regularly offering material to Ukrainska Pravda and other media outlets. She had been named one of the laureates of the International Women’s Media Foundation ‘Courage in Journalism Awards’ for 2022, and it seems that it was to this Foundation that she turned in 2023, seeking support for a very dangerous journalist investigation in occupied Zaporizhzhia oblast. She wanted to identify and find out more about the Russian invaders’ torture prisons which have been established and widely used on all Ukrainian territory while under Russian occupation.
In order to get to occupied Zaporizhzhia oblast, the journalist had to travel to Poland, then Latvia, where she crossed into Russia, and from there, onto occupied Ukrainian territory. From interviews with two of the journalist’s contacts during that period, it is now believed that she was taken prisoner in occupied Enerhodar after being detected by a drone.
Whatever the place, time and other circumstances, this was an illegal abduction, one of the thousands that Russia has begun carrying out on any Ukrainian territory that it has seized. Although criminal charges and enforced transfer to Russia would, in any case have been in violation of international law, there is nothing to suggest that Russia ever concocted any criminal charges or that Victoria had any formal procedural status. It is not inconceivable that, had Russia not finally admitted to their imprisonment of Victoria in April 2024, almost a year after her abduction, that they would not have admitted to her death, for which they bear full responsibility.