More than 20 criminal cases have been opened in Ukraine regarding sexual crimes by Russians

Yana Osadcha, journalist, Ukrainska Pravda.Zhyttia  —  MONDAY, 4 JULY 2022 

The National Police has documented more than 20 criminal proceedings on the committing of sexual crimes by the Russian occupiers.

This was stated by Kateryna Pavlichenko, the Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, in an interview with Ukrinform.

"At the same time, I emphasise that in these 20 cases there may be several cases of sexual violence against several victims, or committed by several criminals. That is, it is not necessary to say that these 20 cases are 20 criminal cases," said the deputy minister.

A part of these proceedings was transferred by the prosecutor's office to the Security Service of Ukraine for further investigation.

However, according to her, the statistics of sexual crimes do not fully reveal the situation that actually occurred.

"We understand that sexual crimes are very latent and complex crimes, when people are not ready, do not want to talk about it and want to forget about it as quickly as possible. Not every person will turn (to the police - ed.) about it, and we don’t have the right to force them to retell these stories," she says.

According to Kateryna Pavlichenko, law enforcement officers learn about such crimes in three ways:

• calls received on line 102 and written statements to the police;
• the work of specialised police teams, when they go to the settlements and communicate with the civilian population there, asking what they know about these crimes and whether they are ready to report them;
• social networks and mass media.

She emphasised that sexual crimes against the civilian population are currently recorded not necessarily based on the statement of the victim, but under Article 438 of the Criminal Code as war crimes.

"If there is information on the Internet, in the media about this situation, then this is also checked and, if the evidence is more or less sufficient, then a criminal proceeding is opened.

At the same time, it is not always possible to gather all the maximum evidence base, sufficient evidence or find witnesses, in order to form the appropriate evidence and then submit it to the court," says Kateryna Pavlichenko.

According to her, several police groups have been created, which include law enforcement officers with experience in dealing with domestic violence.

"These police groups have been working since 18 April in the Kyiv region, since 10 May - in the Sumy region, since 31 May - in the Chernihiv region. In Kyiv region, this group has been working for the longest time - more than 40 settlements have already been investigated and about 15 cases of sexual violence have been detected," the Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine says.