The efforts are part of a broader international effort to support overwhelmed authorities seeking to hold invaders accountable for crimes
Anna Sosonska, deputy head of Ukraine's war crimes unit for sexual violence, and psychologist Vasyl Humeniuk, speak with a survivor in Kherson, Ukraine on December 9 2022. Picture: REUTERS/Anna Voitenko An international team of legal advisers has been working with local prosecutors in Ukraine's recaptured city of Kherson in recent days as they began gathering evidence of alleged sexual crimes by Russian forces as part of a full-scale investigation.
Moscow, which says it is conducting a “special military operation” in Ukraine, has denied committing war crimes or targeting civilians, and the Kremlin denies allegations of sexual violence by the Russian military in Ukraine.
Some residents who remained during the occupation have described being detained and tortured, repeating allegations made by Ukrainians across territory that has been reclaimed by local forces in recent months. Elderfield and Olha Kotlyarska, a legal adviser also working for Global Rights Compliance, together make up the mobile justice team supporting the Ukrainian prosecutors' fact-finding mission in Kherson.They joined Ukrainian prosecutors visiting hospitals, a local aid distribution centre and other sites to pursue lines of investigation and interview victims of alleged abuses, including sexual violence.
“Everywhere where Russian soldiers were based they committed war crimes, they committed sexual violence and they tortured, they murdered,” she said. “We find someone, conduct investigative actions, question, find information and then look for other people.… We conduct them despite the situation, despite the shelling,” he said.
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