Kyiv, Ukraine –
Authorities in Ukraine have created a national registry to document cases of sexual violence allegedly committed by Russian forces, a senior prosecutor told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Viktoriia Litvinova, the country’s deputy prosecutor general, said that the registry was created out of a pilot project that had already resulted in the convictions of five people in absentia. She declined to comment on details of the cases.
“We used to have to visit territories where hostilities are taking place ourselves,” she said. “But now people – individuals who have experienced sexual abuse – are seeking us out for information.”
Litvinova said 303 cases of conflict-related sexual violence had been registered since the start of the full-scale invasion in early 2022, with 112 involving male and 191 involving female victims. Some of the victims have suffered from multiple assaults, she said.