Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, 124 alleged acts of conflict-related sexual violence across Ukraine have been reported to the Human Rights Monitoring Team of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said Pramila Patten, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Sexual Violence in Armed Conflict.
According to Patten, the “available data only represents the tip of the iceberg” and does not reflect the prevalence of sexual violence in the context of the war in Ukraine.
There not being a possibility to investigate all crimes of such kind is due to several reasons, explained the head of the non-profit organisation The Centre for Civil Liberties Oleksandra Matviichuk. First of all, victims of sexual abuse “don’t tell neither law enforcement agents, nor international organisations representatives, nor human rights defenders about what happened to them.” The second reason — the number of sexual violence crimes is too big.
“Literally a few days ago, the Prosecutor General of Ukraine said that they had registered over 15,000 such cases. In several regions, there are around 200 cases for one investigator,” noted Matviichuk.
Also, many citizens of Ukraine are currently forced to live in occupied territories, so they do not have an opportunity to report the abuse.
Earlier, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights published a report, stating that from 24 February to 15 May 2022, OHCHR verified 8,368 civilian casualties, with 3,924 persons killed and 4,444 persons injured.
