Russia plans to withdraw from Europe's anti-torture treaty

Euro News ^ | 8/27/2025 | Kieran Guilbert

[tlozo]

Moscow's decision will likely be seen as inconsequential given growing condemnation of widespread human rights abuses committed in Ukraine.

Russia plans to formally withdraw from Europe's convention against torture and inhuman treatment, according to a decree published this week.

The resolution by Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin calls upon President Vladimir Putin to submit the withdrawal from the treaty to Russia's lower house of parliament.

Moscow's move is likely to be seen as moot given widespread criticism of its worsening human rights record since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

In 2024, UN-backed experts presented evidence that Russia had systematically tortured Ukrainian prisoners of war. Last month, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled that Moscow was responsible for violations of international law in Ukraine — including torture and the use of rape as a weapon of war.

The 1987 European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment was ratified by Russia in 1998, two years after the country joined the Council of Europe (CoE) — the continent's leading human rights body.

The treaty allows the CoE to visit detention facilities in member countries and examine conditions for inmates.

In an unprecedented move, the CoE expelled Russia in March 2022, a month after Moscow launched its all-out war against Ukraine.

Later that year, Russia pulled out of the European Convention on Human Rights, ending its obligation to recognise rulings from the ECHR.

Despite Russia's expulsion from the CoE, the body says it has tried to maintain dialogue with Moscow in order "to resume its monitoring visits to places of deprivation of liberty".

In a statement last November, the CoE's anti-torture committee said it had also requested information from Russia on certain events that had raised concerns, such as the death of opposition leader Alexei Navalny in an Arctic penal colony in February 2024.

Russian NGO Crew Against Torture said that Moscow's withdrawal from the convention "completed the process of dismantling the European human rights monitoring system".

"This decision deprives Russian citizens in prison of their last formal international protection and creates conditions for a further deterioration of the human rights situation in the country," the rights group said in a statement posted on Telegram.

Russia is still a party to the UN Convention Against Torture, which it ratified in 1985. The treaty requires member states to criminalise torture under their national laws, take action to investigate and prosecute complaints, and provide redress to victims.

[tlozo]

Investigation Reveals Systematic Torture of Ukrainians in Russian Prisons

Russian prison authorities are systematically torturing Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war across a network of detention centers, according to a collaborative investigation led by Forbidden Stories, an international consortium of journalists.

Ukraine’s human rights ombudsman says 16,000 civilians have gone missing as of April 2024. Journalists identified 29 facilities, with 11 in occupied Ukraine and 18 inside Russia, some as far as 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) from the border.

The facilities are capable of holding up to 18,000 detainees, the Forbidden Stories report said, and most civilians are held for months or years without formal charges.

“It’s an absurd situation. Even in Stalin’s time, there were always charges,” said Vladimir Zhbankov, who works with a group that helps families search for missing relatives. “All of this exists outside the legal field.”

The investigation documented 695 distinct forms of torture. The most common included electric shocks, waterboarding, mock executions, hammer blows and repeated beatings to the same body part.

A detention center in the Russian city of Taganrog was described as the “darkest” of the sites. Ukrainian journalist Viktoriia Roshchyna died there under unclear circumstances last fall while awaiting a prisoner exchange.

At least 15 other Ukrainians reportedly died at the Taganrog facility, according to survivor testimonies cited by Ukrainian intelligence sources.

Much of the violence is carried out by special units of Russia’s FSIN prison service, which operates under oversight from the Federal Security Service (FSB), the investigation found.

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/04/30/investigation-reveals-systematic-torture-of-ukrainians-in-russian-prisons-a88931

[GBA]

Evil is as evil does, thus showcasing once again a main reason why Ukraine can never surrender to Putin.

The orcs have made it clear enough that Bucha was just the preview for the main event if Ukraine surrenders and is made to disarm.

[If You Want It Fixed - Fix It]

It’s only torture to the victim. Russia doesn’t plan on that.

Stalin didn’t either in 1938.

[Worldtraveler once upon a time]

Makes total sense. One has enemies, and enemies do not make or adhere to treaties with enemies.

I'm waiting for Europe and the US to stop buying from enemies.

The US and Europe are still doing billions of dollars’ worth of business with Russia despite years of war CNN, 14 August 2025.

[BeauBo]

An admission of guilt by the Russians.

[CapandBall]

US citizen and journalist Gonzalo Lira was tortured to death in Ukrainian prison.
.
https://www.helsinkitimes.fi/world-int/24744-the-tragic-end-of-gonzalo-lira-a-voice-silenced-in-ukraine.html

[kiryandil]

I’m old enough to remember:

FALSE: Liudmila Denisova admitted to lying about rapes committed against Ukrainians by russian occupiers
30 червень 2022

https://voxukraine.org/en/false-liudmila-denisova-admitted-to-lying-about-rapes-committed-against-ukrainians-by-russian-occupiers

Liudmyla Leontiivna Denisova (born 6 July 1960) is a Ukrainian politician, and one of the usual pack of lying Ukrainians.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liudmyla_Denisova

[kiryandil]

Yes, projection by the savage Ukies.

[kiryandil]

An admission of guilt by the Russians.

What Pokrovsk and Kupyansk doink?

[tlozo]

US citizen and journalist Gonzalo Lira was tortured to death in Ukrainian prison.

These allegations were strenuously denied by Sarah Ashton-Cirillo, a former American journalist who became a sergeant in the Ukrainian army, in an interview with Business Insider. Ashton-Cirillo said: "In an effort to gain sympathy, Gonzalo Lira made up allegations of abuse and torture. As someone who spoke to him shortly after he was returned to custody, it was clear that he was in good health and treated extremely fairly by the state security services."

https://www.newsweek.com/who-gonzalo-lira-pro-putin-american-expat-dies-ukrainian-jail-1860496

[adorno]

Russia plans to withdraw from Europe's anti-torture treaty

It's just a formality. Russia was never going to abide by any rules in any treaty. Just like Iran and Hamas were never going to observe the right for Israel to live with no terrorism allowed.

Might as well tell a lion that he's not allowed to kill to eat and survive. It's unnatural, just like it's unnatural to expect Putin to observe the rules of war and engagement, and it's also unnatural to expect Russian leaders to leave their neighbors alone.

Tell a bear not to krap in the woods, and notice how quickly turns around and does krap in the woods. It's unnatural and illogical.

[tlozo]

Body of Ukrainian journalist who died in Russian detention returned by Moscow with signs of torture and with missing organs

The body of a young Ukrainian woman who died in Russian captivity after being held incommunicado for months was returned to Ukraine showing signs of torture, Ukrainian prosecutors have said.

Kyiv said the remains of journalist Victoria Roshchyna, who went missing during a reporting trip, were returned as part of a body exchange between Ukraine and Russia in February.

Yuriy Belousov, who heads the war crimes department at the Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office, said that forensic examination found “numerous signs of torture and ill-treatment… including abrasions and hemorrhages on various parts of the body, a broken rib and possible traces of electric shock.”

He said the experts have determined the injuries were sustained while Roshchyna was still alive.

Russia is known to use electric shocks as a method of torture against detained Ukrainians, and the widespread nature of the practice was documented by CNN in the past.

Belousov said that repeated DNA analyses confirmed the body belonged to Roshchyna, even though it reportedly arrived from Russia labeled as “an unidentified male.” He said the state of the body made it impossible to determine the cause of Roshchyna’s death, but added that Ukraine was working with international forensic experts to get more answers.

Roshchyna’s colleagues at Ukrainska Pravda said her body was returned from Russia with missing organs. Citing members of the investigating team who handled her remains, they said the brain, eyeballs and part of the trachea, or windpipe, were missing, in what they said could have been an attempt by Russia to disguise the cause of death.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/04/30/europe/ukrainian-journalist-russia-torture-intl

[TexasGator]

“US citizen and journalist Gonzalo Lira was tortured to death in Ukrainian prison.”

Your link and also the embedded note from Gonzalo make no mention of torture.

[BeauBo]

"What Pokrovsk and Kupyansk doink?"

Remaining in Ukrainian control, despite 1,000 Russian casualties every day.

Yesterday was day 1,280, of Putin's 3 day war.

Recent estimates based on current rates of advance and casualty rates, indicate that Russia could capture the rest of Donetsk Oblast in about 4.5 years, at a cost of about two million more casualties.

But there is no way the Russian economy will hold up that long. Russia's oil industry is now all tee'd up to be knocked out long term, like it's natural gas industry has already been.

Remember when Gazprom used to make money? Those days are gone.

This Winter will be the one where Russia's oil infrastructure takes the kind of crushing freeze damage that it did after the fall of the Soviet Union - which took two decades to repair, with the help of the International oil majors, who are unlikely to risk their money again, on hard to extract/transport Russian deposits, when better prospects are available elsewhere.

Long range strike weapons are proliferating to Ukraine - not a coincidence. Non-Russian oil supply has been ramping up rapidly over the last six months - not a coincidence.

What Russian refineries doink?

What Russian Gas lines doink?

What Russian gas prices doink?

You ain't seen nothing yet. Putin makes a deal, or the hammer drops on Russia hard. This Winter. Maybe September.

[TexasGator]

As the German army began its invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, Stalin ordered the Soviet Secret Service (NKVD) to “remove” the prison population in the USSR’s occupied territories rather than allow them to fall into German hands.

This was largely accomplished through the mass murder of prisoners at various locations in Western Ukraine, Belarus, Estonia, and Lithuania. The majority of the mass executions, later termed “the 1941 NKVD Prison Massacres” by local residents, occurred in Western Ukraine.

Due to a lack of reliable sources, exact numbers are impossible to determine; however, historians estimate that the NKVD killed somewhere between 10,000 and 40,000 people in dozens of prisons over the course of eight days.

The ethnic breakdown of casualties in Western Ukraine roughly corresponded to population demographics: 70 percent of the victims were Ukrainian, 20 percent Polish, and the remainder consisted of Jews and other nationalities.

https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/1941-nkvd-prison-massacres-western-ukraine

[x]

An anti-torture treaty, but the Eurovision song contest still goes on?

[kiryandil]

old news, my Stalker chum.

Anyone familiar with that era knows about the scumbag Uncle Joe was up to.

[adorno]

US citizen and journalist Gonzalo Lira was tortured to death in Ukrainian prison. .

Is that something that happens routinely and often in Ukraine?

I wonder if you could provide links to the many times Ukraine has bombed Russian cities and killed innocent civilians. Can you also provide links to news stories where Ukraine abducted thousands of Russian children and held them hostage, or to force them into indoctrination?

Uhhggghh! Those dastardly Ukrainian monsters!

[TexasGator]

Anyone familiar with this era should know about what the scumbag Putin is up to.

[adorno]

So, according to YOU, Russia is not guilty of committing any war crimes they’re accused of?

Putin’s best defenders occupy and reside in western countries.