‘You’ll see her in 10 years minimum’: Russian FSB disappears schoolteacher in Ukraine’s occupied Kherson region

Officers from Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) abducted a 52-year-old history teacher in the occupied part of Ukraine’s Kherson region on 5 August, and her whereabouts remain unknown, according to the independent outlet Important Stories.

Hanna Pyrozhenko was seized in the village of Pershokostiantynivka after somebody anonymously reported her to authorities, her relatives told journalists. Security officers confiscated her phone and laptop before driving her away to an unknown location. They reportedly told her family they would not see her again for “at least 10 years”. Her relatives believe she is being held in a facility near the city of Henichesk.

“They just took a person who is guilty of nothing, who never did anyone any harm. She followed one route — from home to my grandmother’s, to her brother’s, and back. She didn’t go anywhere else, didn’t travel, didn’t talk to anyone,” a relative of Pyrozhenko said.

The day after the arrest, Pyrozhenko’s husband set out to search for her. According to Crimean Tatar activists, security officers beat him, tortured him with an electric shock device, confiscated his Ukrainian documents and forced him to leave the occupied territory. Important Stories said it was unable to reach him for comment.

Officials at the Henichesk district court said Pyrozhenko is suspected of incitement to extremism. FSB officers, however, told her relatives she was under investigation on espionage charges linked to a social media repost, as well as for allegedly possessing explosives. Her family believes the case against her was fabricated.

Pyrozhenko taught history at the only school in the village. She resigned in 2022 to care for her 83-year-old mother and her 77-year-old brother, who has a disability. Security forces searched her home once before, in 2025, but brought no charges at the time.

Her mother, Lidiya Pyrozhenko, was born in a Nazi concentration camp during World War II and later worked as a teacher herself. Members of the Russian occupation administration have repeatedly photographed her for propaganda purposes, and in 2025 they awarded her a commemorative medal marking the 80th anniversary of the Soviet victory against Nazi Germany.