Russian authorities hold abducted Kyiv region resident Vasyl Manchuk in Russia’s Tula region
Russian forces abducted Vasyl Manchuk, a resident of the village of Nove Zasillia in the Kyiv region, on 9 March 2022. He was first held in Hostomel and later transferred to Novozybkov in Russia’s Bryansk region. The 35-year-old Ukrainian is now being held in Donskoy in Russia’s Tula region, his mother Olena Manchuk told ZMINA.
Olena Manchuk. Photo credit: ZMINAWhen Russian forces occupied the Bucha District in the Kyiv Oblast, Vasyl Manchuk and his family – his common-law wife and their two sons – moved to the Rivne Oblast. From there, he took his family to Poland but decided to return home, as his mother remained in the occupied area.
“He didn’t want to leave me alone, so he decided to return“, Olena Manchuk says.
On 8 March 2022, she was still in contact with her son, but the following day, he stopped responding. That same day, she called her younger son and asked whether his older brother had contacted him. He said Vasyl had planned to visit him but never arrived. It later emerged that on 9 March 2022, Vasyl Manchuk was abducted by Russian forces while returning home.
Realising that Manchuk had gone missing, his relatives filed a report with the police.
“I lost contact with my younger son for a whole month. When I finally reached him, he said he had no information about Vasyl’s fate. Later, an investigator told me that Vasyl had reached Kyiv by train and then set off on foot to return home. He had to cross the Irpin River. According to mobile network records, his phone was last traced to Pushcha-Vodytsia. Because of this, the case was transferred from the Rivne region to Kyiv“, his mother says.
In early 2023, a photo of Vasyl appeared on the Telegram channel “Iryna Ukraina”, stating that he was being held in a pre-trial detention centre in Novozybkov, Bryansk region.
Later that year, Olena Manchuk was contacted by a former detainee who had shared a cell with her son. He said that on 9 March, Vasyl was in Moshchun, on his way home. It suddenly started raining, and he got soaked. Local residents noticed and invited him into their home, giving him dry clothes. However, as he was leaving the yard, Russian soldiers spotted him and took him away.
“He and others were held in Hostomel [Kyiv Oblast] for five days, and after 20 March, they were taken to Russia. The former detainee told me that everyone who was in Russian captivity was later transferred to other places of detention“, Olena says.
She said she received only one letter from Vasyl, in which he wrote that he was “alive and well”.
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In spring 2025, Olena Manchuk learned from a released prisoner of war that Manchuk was being held in Donskoy, Tula region, Russia.
“Those who have been released say the men are holding on, helping and supporting one another. They say the detainees know we are holding peaceful rallies and are also aware of the large-scale prisoner exchange. We hope our authorities will find a mechanism to bring civilians back from Russian captivity. They have been held there for nearly four years now“, the woman said.
The Human Rights Centre ZMINA, along with Ukrainian and international partners, documents enforced disappearances, detentions, and abductions of civilians in the temporarily occupied territories. If your relatives have gone missing or you fear they may have been abducted, please contact us at ys@zmina.ua. Our representative will get in touch with you.
The information provided, subject to the applicant’s consent, will be used in submissions to national and international investigative bodies, as well as to international organisations for inclusion in periodic reports, including the UN Committee against Torture, the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, the International Criminal Court, and others, to support the documentation and investigation of war crimes committed in Ukraine and help bring those responsible to justice.
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