Ukrainian journalist Victoria Roshchyna, who was captured by Russian forces in the summer of 2023, endured brutal torture in captivity, according to an investigation by Slidstvo.Info. Investigators found she suffered knife wounds, electric shocks, and became so emaciated her weight dropped to just 30 kilograms. Russian prison staff reportedly hid her from inspections to conceal her deteriorating condition.
Roshchyna was taken prisoner in August 2023 while reporting from Russian-occupied territories. For months, her whereabouts were unknown. It wasn’t until May 2024 that Russian authorities officially acknowledged her detention, confirming she was being held at Taganrog Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2 in Russia’s Rostov region.
In October 2024, her father received a letter—allegedly from Russia’s Ministry of Defense—stating she had died in captivity on Sept. 19, 2024. The letter gave no explanation for her death but said her body would be returned to Ukraine as part of a prisoner body exchange. Nearly five months later, Ukrainian officials say her body still hasn’t been transferred. They suspect Russian authorities are withholding it to cover up evidence of torture.
Roshchyna, 27, had been reporting from dangerous occupied areas since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. She started her journalism career as a teenager, covering court rulings and crime, and later worked for major Ukrainian independent outlets, including Hromadske and Ukrainska Pravda. Russian forces first detained her in March 2022, holding her for about a week. Despite the risks, she returned to occupied territories in the summer of 2023 to continue her reporting.
Investigators traced her 2023 route, showing she crossed into Russia through Poland and Latvia before reaching occupied southern Ukraine. Her goal was to investigate Russian-run torture chambers in Zaporizhzhia Oblast, particularly in Enerhodar and surrounding towns.
According to a source identified only as Andriy, who communicated with Roshchyna during her assignment, she was documenting the conditions prisoners of war faced in these facilities.
“She asked about safe ways to enter occupied areas and looked for places to stay in Melitopol, Berdyansk and Enerhodar,” Andriy told Slidstvo.Info.
He also said Roshchyna was especially interested in how employees at the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant were treated in detention and in the disappearances of local residents. Her last known communication came from Enerhodar, after which she disappeared. Investigators later determined she was held at a Russian-run torture facility in occupied Zaporizhzhia before being transferred to Taganrog.
A former detainee at Taganrog provided chilling testimony about the abuse Roshchyna endured. The witness, who shared a cell with her, said interrogators used electric shocks and inflicted knife wounds, leaving scars on her arms and legs. The cellmate described a fresh, three-centimeter knife wound between her elbow and wrist.
“She always said she was a journalist,” the former detainee said. “She called one of her torturers an idiot.”
According to her cellmate, Roshchyna repeatedly begged for help but was denied essential medication, including painkillers. Her health deteriorated rapidly, and she became so weak she couldn’t stand without help from other detainees. Severe stomach pain, fever, and panic attacks left her crying out that she wouldn’t survive the night.
During a visit by a Russian human rights ombudsman, prison staff reportedly hid Roshchyna in a locked room on another floor to prevent her condition from being seen. Though she was briefly hospitalized, she was eventually returned to her cell, still gravely ill.
Iryna Didenko, a senior prosecutor with Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office, said the conditions Roshchyna endured amount to torture and clear violations of international human rights laws.
“Detention facilities aren’t meant to be places where people die,” Didenko said. “But those who return from Russian captivity often show extreme weight loss. Victoria’s condition was even worse. She was small, young and thin to begin with, and the inhumane conditions only accelerated her decline.”
The last confirmed trace of Roshchyna came on Sept. 8, when she was removed from her cell and taken to an unknown location. No one has seen or heard from her since.
