In the first days of the full-scale Russian invasion, 11 Ukrainian penal institutions were occupied. The prisoners had not been evacuated from them. Only four penal institutions in Kherson and Mykolaiv regions were liberated by the end of 2022. The Melitopol penitentiary (No. 144), where women and underage girls were held, is still under occupation. The Suspilne investigative editorial office has found out how this penal institution currently operates and what is happening to its prisoners. To do this, we spoke with the former head of the institution and with a woman who was released in March 2024, having previously spent almost two years under the Russian regime.
They continued to execute the decisions of Ukrainian courts
Melitopol was occupied on February 26, 2022. However, the leadership of the Melitopol penitentiary continued to perform its duties for more than three months.
"No matter what was happening outside the perimeter of the institution, our staff and I were performing our duties exactly in accordance with the current legislation of our country. This was the only way. We continued to execute the decisions of Ukrainian courts," the then head of the institution, Svitlana Piasetska, told the Suspilne investigative editorial office.
According to her, during that time, there were no escapes, unlawful release, or unlawful detention of persons in the institution.
The former head also adds that the occupiers repeatedly came to the institution and offered help, including food, but the administration refused anything. Piasetska says they had everything they needed to support their activities.
Parole as an opportunity to save convicts from occupation
At the beginning of the full-scale invasion, according to Piasetska, there were 76 prisoners in the Melitopol penitentiary, three of whom were minors. She says that from March 2022, the institution began to apply to the court to release some of the prisoners on parole.
"We were able to release as many convicts, who were eligible for parole, as possible under legal conditions. The courts were not operating in Melitopol. Therefore, with the assistance of the South-Eastern Interregional Department for the execution of criminal sentences, we submitted documents to the Tomakivskyi Court of Dnipropetrovsk region. The court satisfied all of them without exception. After receiving the release documents, these people were transported to Zaporizhzhia through the green corridor," says the former head of the institution.
According to the data from the court register, during March-June 2022, the court issued 31 decisions on the parole release of prisoners from the Melitopol penitentiary.
As of June 9, 2022, 45 women remained in the institution, says Svitlana Piasetska.
"Two minor girls were released on parole, another one turned 18, so she was transferred to a sector of the institution where convicted adults are held. At the time of my departure from Melitopol, there were no minors in the institution. Now all three girls are free, they are in Ukraine-controlled territory," she added.
Occupation and Russian rules
Svitlana Piasetska says that in June 2022, it became impossible to continue working without collaboration with the Russians, so she and part of the staff left the occupied territory.
One of the former prisoners told us what was happening in the institution after the Russian leadership and guards appeared there. Olena (the name has been changed for security reasons) was released from the Melitopol penitentiary only in March 2024.
"In June-July 2022, the Russians began to adjust everything to their legislation. Through the court decisions, the prisoners’ Ukrainian conviction articles were changed in accordance with the Russian legislation. There were no considerable changes. There was work and the prisoners were working. However, they were not allowed to call relatives with Ukrainian phone numbers. They could call only those who were in the occupied territory and in Russia," says Olena.
According to her, she did not see that the Russians were bringing new convicts to the institution. They released prisoners only by decision of the occupation courts.
In Olena’s opinion, 25 women who were there at the beginning of the full-scale invasion may still be serving sentences in the institution.
"The Russians review criminal cases through the courts. They can reduce the terms by a day, a month, three, five, nine months and thus release prisoners. They can simply "change" the article to the Russian one and that is all. They do not release people on parole," the woman notes.
Olena also says that she did not see the occupiers physically abuse the prisoners, but she adds, "Unlike Ukrainians, Russians constantly use swear words. This is a normal for them. They do not care about convicts".
Olena was released on March 15, 2024. The same day she left Melitopol, and then left the occupied territory. She first returned to her native Kherson, but since the city suffers daily from Russian shelling, she went abroad. She says that now everyday things, such as loud New Year’s celebrations, remind her of the sounds of drones, and planes in the sky scare her.
"I really want to go home; I want to go back to Ukraine. I want to believe that everything will end soon," the woman adds.
Were there evacuation plans and attempts to take out prisoners?
Of the 11 correctional facilities that were occupied at the beginning of the full-scale invasion, seven have not yet been liberated. In addition to the women’s institution in Melitopol, these are the Mariupol detention center and the Pryazovska corrective labor colony in Donetsk region, the Starobilskyi detention center in Luhansk region, the Holoprystanska corrective labor colony in Kherson region, the Veselivkyi correctional center and the Primorska corrective labor colony in Zaporizhzhia region.
In response to the Suspilne request, the Department for the execution of criminal sentences of the Ministry of Justice reported that there is a procedure for the mandatory evacuation of certain categories of the population in the event of the introduction of martial law. According to it, the Ministry of Justice annually develops a so-called calculation of the movement of persons held in penal institutions and pre-trial detention centers.
The calculation is coordinated with the National Guard of Ukraine and sent to interregional departments for the execution of criminal sentences to process and develop plans for the evacuation of penitentiaries and pre-trial detention centers to safe areas.
"Such a calculation was sent to all interregional departments for the execution of criminal sentences in January 2022 to develop appropriate plans for the evacuation of convicts. The calculation itself is information with limited access," the response to the request states.
The Ministry of Justice responded to our request that by June 25, 2022, convicts and detainees had been evacuated from 11 institutions of the State Penitentiary Service of Ukraine. These are institutions that had not been occupied by the Russians by that time.
The Ministry of Justice noted that the average evacuation time was from one to three days. In total, 4,628 people were relocated from Orikhivska, Vilnianska, Sofiivska, Kamenska, Pokrovska, Toretska, and Selydivska corrective labor colonies, as well as from Vilnianska and Bakhmutska penal institutions, Druzheliubivskyi and Novobuzkyi correctional centers.
The Ministry of Justice added that evacuation from institutions located in the occupied territories is not within their powers.
We has not received an answer to the question whether the Ministry of Justice addressed the Russian side to evacuate convicted Ukrainian citizens from correctional institutions that were temporarily occupied.
The Ministry of Justice only noted, "We took all possible measures and considered options for the fastest possible evacuation of staff and convicts from institutions located in the temporarily occupied territories. The Ministry of Justice appealed to the Minister for the Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories, Iryna Vereshchuk, with a request to consider the issue of the possible evacuation of staff and convicts through humanitarian corridors."
The Suspilne investigative editorial office asked the Ministry of National Unity (the successor to the Ministry for the Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories) about the results of considering the Ministry of Justice’s appeal. We received a response that the information needs to be processed within 30 days. As of the time of publication of this article, there was no further response.
The Office of the Ombudsman of Ukraine told us that they "continuously use the full range of opportunities, including international platforms, to highlight issues of non-compliance with the rights of Ukrainian citizens in the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine and the territory of the Russian Federation, and also take all possible measures to find effective solutions for the fastest possible release and return of our citizens, preserving their lives and health."
They also added that mechanisms for evacuating people held in penitentiary institutions in the temporarily occupied territories can only be implemented if appropriate conditions are created — in particular, through international humanitarian initiatives.
In accordance with the norms of the international humanitarian law, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has a mandate to confirm the stay of civilians in penitentiary institutions, visit their places of detention, ascertain their health status, and obtain other information from the aggressor country.
However, in his address to the participants of the G20 international summit in November 2022, President Zelensky noted that the ICRC "is not fully fighting for access to camps where Ukrainian prisoners of war and political prisoners are held," and called this "self-elimination and self-destruction of the Red Cross as an organization".
On December 10, 2022, during a meeting with the President of the Red Cross Mirjana Spoljaric-Egger in Kyiv, the head of the President’s Office of Ukraine, Andrii Yermak, once again pointed out that the ICRC representatives were demonstrating passivity in ensuring the rights of Ukrainians who were captured by the Russians.
Spoljaric-Egger promised to discuss with the organization how to improve conditions for prisoners of war and prevent torture. At the same time, she noted that under international law, the Red Cross does not have the authority to obligatory obtain permission to visit places of detention of prisoners. "We are trying to maintain a dialogue and hope that we will be able to develop large-scale activities in this direction," she said.
Today, it is almost unknown what is happening in the Ukrainian penal institutions in the Russia-occupied territories. The closed operation of penitentiary institutions under the control of the occupiers, the lack of access to objective information, and the impossibility of independent monitoring create the ground for human rights violations.