by Martha Serafini
Traumatized citizens arrive at the reception centers, Human Rights Watch documents all violations. The haircut in the military, like in the Nazi concentration camps
“I fled from Donetsk here to Odessa after 2014. I know what that means. And I, these women who come from Kherson, don’t ask them what happened, it’s too early. The voice of Olga, a volunteer at the Aid Center for Displaced Persons in the city, is broken and asks not to give her name to publish in full. Three minutes of silence. Then the breath stops. “Here we train the psychologists who have to support them, I know what they need. And now they must be left alone.” Every day, dozens of women leave the reception center, a room with a few mattresses in a damp basement. “They only sleep here for one night, then we will find better accommodation for them. You need silence. Only then will it be time to talk. But not now. It’s too early,” he says.
The burned bodies
When photographer Mikhail Palinchak immortalized the partially burned bodies of a man and three naked women on a highway 20 kilometers from the capital Kyiv on Sunday, the horror of wartime rape came into focus again. Unfortunately, Ukraine is not the first conflict in which women are victims of rape. Balkans, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Sudan. Abuses are not only statistically more common than in peacetime, but also become a weapon in war. And Ukraine is no exception. Even if there are still few testimonies.
“There are many who talk about women being taken away, but I didn’t see it with my eyes. I managed to save my wife and one daughter while my parents stayed in Kherson with the other one because there was no way to get them out too. You can’t imagine how much he suffers: not being able to do anything for them without even having news, says Roslan, who fled to Kherson from Odessa.
Human Rights Watch interviewed 10 people, including witnesses, victims, and residents of Russianheld territories, either in person or by phone. Some of them asked to be identified by their name or pseudonym only. On March 4, Russian forces rounded up five men in Bucha, about 30 kilometers northwest of Kyiv, and summarily executed one of them. A witness said they forced them to kneel by the side of the road, pulled their shirts over their heads and shot one of them in the back of the head. “He fell,” said the witness, “and the women screamed.”
sexual violence
A woman, who uses the madeup name Olha, keeps telling Human Rights Watch that a Russian soldier repeatedly raped her at a school in the Kharkiv region where she and her family took refuge on March 13. She explains that the soldier raped her, beat her and cut her face, neck and hair with a knife. The next day, the woman fled to Kharkiv, where she was able to receive medical treatment and help. Human Rights Watch examined two photos the woman shared showing her facial injuries.
Rape and sexual assault are considered war crimes and violations of international humanitarian law, and both the Prosecutor General of Ukraine and the International Criminal Court have announced investigations. But that does little to calm Ukrainian women’s fears. On April 1, 15 female soldiers who were freed in a prisoner exchange between Kyiv and Moscow had their heads shaved. Like German women after the end of World War II. Like the Jewish women in the concentration camps. The news was announced by the President of the Human Rights Commission of the Ukrainian Parliament, Dmytro Lubinets, who posted some pictures on Facebook. “They did it as a sign of humiliation, arrogance and contempt.” Data and evidence that the MP wants to add to those collected so far to present the case in The Hague.
But it’s not just Russian soldiers that Ukrainian women need to protect themselves from. “Here in Odessa, tension has increased with the curfew,” said Natalia, a city police officer. Civil Guard men walk around armed and covered in balaclavas. And a few days ago, the alcohol ban was lifted. “Reports of domestic violence have gone down. But I’ve forbidden my 14yearold daughter to go out alone these days.”
April 4, 2022 (change April 4, 2022 | 23:07)
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