Russian forces are using brutal torture methods against Ukrainian prisoners and civilians, including the use of a Soviet-era military telephone to electrocute Ukrainian prisoners in a torture practice chillingly nicknamed a “call to Putin,” according to a forthcoming United Nations report.
The device, a hand-cranked TA-57 field telephone, nicknamed "tapik", delivers shocks of up to 80 volts when wires are attached to victims’ ears, fingers, feet, and genitals.
The UN special rapporteur on torture, Dr Alice Jill Edwards, said the scale of abuse in occupied Ukraine was “off the charts,” describing it as “widespread and systematic, amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity”, according to The Telegraph.
The method, also known as a “call to Lenin,” is one of several forms of torture documented.
Survivors also described a range of other atrocities, including gang rapes, beatings, burning nipples, threats of castration and mock executions.
One victim from Kherson was sodomised with a rifle, lost teeth in beatings, and endured a simulated drowning session. Another man from the same region reported waterboarding, while his girlfriend was threatened with rape.
Another woman reported being molested and threatened with the rape of her infant daughter.
Dr Edwards, who has written to the Kremlin seeking a response, said responsibility lay at the highest levels of Russia’s leadership.
“It is the level of the state; it’s Putin himself and [foreign minister Sergei] Lavrov who have responsibility for these types of policies,” she was quoted as saying by The Telegraph, adding that she has never seen directives ordering soldiers to stop torturing.
The report draws on 10 case studies involving four women and six men from regions later liberated by Ukrainian forces.
As per The Telegraph, victims were often detained for refusing Russian passports or for alleged ties to Ukraine’s military. In some cases, torture was used to extract information or force signed confessions, later exploited for blackmail.
Ukraine’s prosecutor general documented at least 363 cases of sexual violence by Russian forces by June, including 19 involving children, according to the New York Post.
Further cases were documented in Bucha, where Russian troops reportedly tortured and executed men, while women and girls were held captive and raped. Ukraine’s ombudswoman Lyudmyla Denisova cited a case where nine women became pregnant after being held in a basement for 25 days, reported Metro UK.
Dr Edwards stressed that such practices form part of Russia’s war policy. “The Russian state itself will be held accountable. Torture remains part of, in my view, Russian war tactics and war policy,” she said.
She added that victims’ testimonies must be preserved as evidence for future trials and accountability, adding, “Justice always comes. It may come very late, but the goal here is to keep the focus on these terrible violations and put pressure on Russia to stop them.”