Thanks to the cooperation with the Permanent Mission of Ukraine to the United Nations, human rights activists managed to draw the world's attention to the crimes that occur on the temporarily occupied territories of Donbas – Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts of Ukraine.

 

The report is prepared by the Coalition in cooperation with the Office of the Ombudsperson. The study is based on testimonies of those, who have been unlawfully placed in places of deprivation of liberty in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts by illegal armed groups. Information was collected during the monitoring visits to places of deprivation of liberty on the liberated territories, as well as obtained from public authorities and open sources. Collected facts demonstrate gross and systematic human rights violations against persons who were illegally placed to places of deprivation of liberty, kept in inhumane conditions, and subjected to ill-treatment and torture.

 

"This report describes in detail the system of kidnapping and torturing organized by the illegal armed formations. Every second civilian surveyed by us was subjected to torture and ill-treatment. Among them were the elderly, minors, and pregnant women. We deal with international crimes that have no statutory limitation. Those responsible for committing them should be punished. Both those who committed these crimes and those whose decisions have made them possible should bear responsibility," believes Oleksandra Matviychuk from the Center for Civil Liberties, one of the authors of the report.

 

"For us, internally displaced persons from Donbas, it is extremely important that the world know the truth about the situation of human rights in Luhansk and Donetsk regions. I sincerely hope that the dissemination of the report prepared by the Coalition among the United Nations agencies will help those who are unlawfully kept in places of deprivation of liberty, created by illegal armed groups," says Volodymyr Shcherbachenko, coordinator of the Justice for Peace in Donbas Coalition.

 

Based on the gathered data, advocates came up with the measures aimed at curbing the identified human rights violations on the territories not controlled by Ukrainian government, attracting the attention of international community to the problems described, and prosecuting perpetrators of these violations.

 

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The Justice for Peace in Donbas Coalition, which unites 17 Ukrainian NGOs, was created with the support of UNDP and other partners in 2014.

 

In order to ensure the documentation of human rights violations, the Justice for Peace in Donbas Coalition uses the professional data storage and tracking software, which was purchased and installed with UNDP and other partners support. The database is operational with over 120 cases of human rights violations documented and entered into the database. It will be used to seek humanitarian law remedies and redress (e.g., ECHR, IHL, domestic criminal and civil law cases) for victims, many of whom are IDPs and other vulnerable members of communities in Donbas.

 

The coalition is supported by the Democratization, Human Rights and Civil Society Development Programme, implemented by UNDP with financial support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark.