Yevhen Panov brutally tortured during first three days in occupied Crimea – human rights activist

Yevhen Panov, a resident of Enerhodar town in Zaporizhzhia region, Ukraine, was brutally tortured during his first three days of staying in Crimea.

This is reported by the Crimean Human Rights Group, referring to a source close to the security forces in the occupied Crimea, the Human Rights Information Centre reports.

“Several people tortured him. He was handcuffed, tied to a chair with a duct tape and put a bag on his head. Then the wires were connected to him and electric current was switched on. Security officials threatened Panov with sexual violence…” the human rights activists quote the source as saying.

“So they have achieved that he said in the video what the FSB needed. In the same way he refused the lawyer of his family,” says Yevhen’s brother, Ihor Kotelyanets.

Olha Skrypnyk, the human rights activist of the Crimean Human Rights Group, says that such methods of torture were used against Gennady Afanasyev Oleg Sentsov, Andriy Kolomiets, and Oleksandr Kostenko.

According to the brother of Yevhen Panov, the message, which had been previously made public by the FSB and in which Yevhen Panov allegedly refused the family’s lawyer, cannot be considered to be a document.

“According to the Russian law, a suspect must write the rejection and put a signature,” Ihor Kotelyanets says.

“Our lawyer is trying to get to Yehen every day for three weeks already, but always gets refusal from security officers,” he adds.

Human rights activist Olha Skrypnyk says that “the case of Ukrainian saboteurs” is one of the closest cases in the occupied Crimea. Today it is difficult to say what articles the defendants are accused on.

“There are only public reports citing the FSB, but it is impossible to look through the case files personally. Yesterday, the Foreign Ministry told us that Russia accuses Yevhen Panov on Article 208 of the Criminal Code (organization of an illegal armed formation and participation in it) but we cannot say this for sure – there may be other articles,” Olha Skrypnyk explains. She refers to the wife of another detainee in the case, Andriy Zakhtey, who reported her husband was charged on terrorism.

In addition, the human rights defenders have no information about the third defendant in the case, Ridvan Suleymanov.

August 10, the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) said that citizen of Ukraine Yevhen Panov had been detained in Crimea. The Service claimed he was one of the organizers of the terrorist attacks, which allegedly had been prepared in the occupied Crimea.