Gorilyk Roman Vasilyovich’s condition after being kept in a detention camp in Russia for two years
A Chernobyl security guard is the latest face of ‘hunger torture’ by Putin’s soldiers, after being held as a prisoner of war in Russia for more than two years.
Gorilyk Roman Vasilyovich was among 168 workers protecting the nuclear facility, who were taken captive and deported from Ukraine through Belarus a few weeks after the start of Putin’s invasion in March 2022.
He was finally returned to his homeland on Friday as part of a POW exchange – but he was never a soldier.
Now pictures of Gorilyk serve as evidence of the Kremlin using hunger as a torture method.
Gorilyk was held in a Russian detention camp for more than two years
He did get out of alive – barely – but his emaciated condition is reminiscent of the way prisoners in Nazi concentration camps were treated during World War Two.
His skeletal frame is a testament to prolonged deprivation. Gorilyk looks frail. His ribs and bones protrude sharply under his pallid skin.
Muscles have withered away, leaving his limbs fragile, like twigs that could snap.
His face is hollowed, cheeks and eyes sunk deep into his skull. What is left of Gorilyk is skin and bones, and it will take a long time before he recovers.
It will take a long time for Gorilyk to recover
The pictures were shared online by I Want To Live, a hotline that receives appeals from Russian servicemen in Ukraine.
It said: ‘Gorilyk and the other 168 national guards guarding the Chernobyl plant were literally taken hostage by Russians and deported from Ukraine via Belarus in March 2022.
’89 are still being held captive, and Russia uses them to exchange them for troops captured in battle.
‘The condition of Gorilyk and other Ukrainian prisoners of war is terrifying and associations with the darkest pages of human history – Nazi concentration camps.
He is not the first POW to report being starved
‘During their stay in Russian captivity, Roman and other 74 Ukrainian POWs returned by exchange, never visited the observers of the International Committee of the Red Cross.
‘Not allowing observers to prisoners of war in violation of the provisions of the Geneva Conventions is a conscientious and purposeful policy of the Russian government.
‘This is done on purpose so that the International Red Cross cannot record the way the Russian side treats prisoners of war.’
Other Ukrainians have also reported being starved while detained, in addition to being beaten, raped and electrocuted by their genitals.
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