21 civilians from the Mykolaiv region are being held captive by Russia, and more than 500 are abducted from the Kherson region

Residents of Snihurivka, November 2023, photo: Andriy Dubchak, Donbas Frontliner

Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the Russian military has abducted 21 civilians from the territories under their control of the Mykolaiv region, and 526 people from the Kherson region.

As of November 4, the Media Initiative for Human Rights managed to identify such a number.

The documentarians found that even before the invasion, Russian security forces kidnapped more than 100 people. They are still being held on the territory of Russia. However, after February 24, 2022, that number is 1,932.

Infographic: Media initiative for human rights

The largest number of identified kidnapped Ukrainians from the Kherson region is 526, and only 204 are those who were kidnapped in Kherson itself.

According to the infographic, the share of Mykolaiv residents supported by Russians is the smallest — only 1%, i.e. 21 people. These are, as indicated on the map, residents of the Snihurivka region occupied from March 19, 2022 to November 10, 2023.

Also, during the occupation of Kyiv, Chernihiv and Sumy regions, more than 288 people were abducted and are still in captivity.

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Documentaries note that the real number of abductees is probably much higher. After detention, civilians are first held in the occupied territories, and then, as a rule, deported to the Russian Federation.

«After the abduction of civilians, they can be held for a certain time in places of deprivation of liberty in the occupied territories of Ukraine, but the general practice of the Russians is to deport as many people as possible to the Russian Federation. Ukrainians are tortured in almost all Russian prisons and detention centers. Subsequently, illegal trials are started against arbitrarily detained civilians based on fabricated cases,» the authors of the material point out.

We would like to remind you that in the case of civilian Ukrainians who are in Russian captivity, no exchanges are carried out — only returns. Human rights commissioner Dmytro Lubinets told about this in June.