Abductions in Crimea after the full-scale invasion: Secret detention centres, Putin's classified decree and hundreds of names

Abductions in Crimea began in the first days of its occupation by Russia. After the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, abductions of Crimeans continued. Crimean detainees were also joined in detention by abducted civilians who were secretly transported to the peninsula from other occupied territories. All these people were held without the knowledge of their lawyers and families in new pre-trial detention centers opened specifically for this purpose.

According to our estimates, at least 230 people have been victims of enforced disappearances in Crimea over the past twelve years. It is impossible to determine the exact number, but clearly it is significantly higher.

The volume of these abductions is the result of a deliberate and consistent policy that Russia has been pursuing since the beginning of the occupation. The same abduction tactics have been used since 2014, and they are carried out by the same security agencies, primarily the FSB. In March 2022, this practice received formal legal approval in the form of a secret Putin's "decree", which allows the detention of individuals without a court order "for opposing the special military operation (SMO)." The formulation is so vague that it permits the abduction of people for literally any display of dissent – from participating in the partisan movement in the Kherson region to subscribing to Ukrainian Telegram channels found on a phone during "filtration."

For many months, we have been searching for information about abductions in Crimea in collaboration with a research team from the Ukrainian Archive at Mnemonic, an organization that specializes in collecting, preserving, and analyzing evidence of human rights violations and war crimes during the war in Ukraine. After a detailed analysis, we reconstructed the horrific terror that Russia has organized on the peninsula since the beginning of the occupation and continues to perpetuate today.

"This is a steady stream of abductions that follows a clear pattern. The number remains roughly the same every year – neither exceeding nor falling short of the plan so as neither to overload themselves nor skew the statistics. This is a deliberate state policy", says a former Crimean lawyer. For security reasons we cannot reveal their name, or the identities of the other Crimeans we interviewed extensively for this article.

In our work, we primarily relied on the results of our own name-by-name search. Meanwhile, cases of abductions are also documented by international, Ukrainian government, and civil society organizations: the Representative Office of the President of Ukraine in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, the Crimean Human Rights Group, the Crimean Tatar Resource Center, the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, and others. These organizations use various methodologies and sources, which may explain the differences in their estimates.

According to the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, 104 people were abducted in Crimea between 2014 and 2024. This number includes 43 individuals abducted during the first two years of the occupation, according to data from the Ukrainian human rights organization CrimeaSOS.

The investigative team of the Ukrainian Archive at Mnemonic has identified and verified 94 individuals who have been victims of enforced disappearances from the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine through the end of 2025. These individuals were abducted directly in Crimea. However, this number should be supplemented by more than a hundred additional verified persons who were secretly transported to Crimea after being abducted in the occupied southern part of Ukraine. Most of these persons are residents of temporarily occupied areas in the Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, and parts of Donetsk regions.

Our report on how Russia turned abductions into one of the key tools of its occupation policy in Crimea is divided into four parts:

– the first months of the occupation;

– how a system of abductions that served as a tool for suppressing dissent had been established on the peninsula and practically replaced criminal investigations during political persecution by 2022;

– how this system changed for Crimeans after the start of the full-scale invasion;

– and, finally, how Crimea became a transit hub for people abducted from other occupied territories.

We begin this publication with the most critical part: what is currently occurring in Crimea. Crimeans suspected of dissent or pro-Ukrainian sympathies by the occupying authorities are abducted, tortured to extract "confessions," and then held incommunicado (in isolation, cut off from the outside world) for months or even years. The regulatory authorities cover up these abductions, and the occupying courts legitimize them once the abductee, driven to desperation and under pressure, is willing to sign any statement. It is impossible to achieve justice when faced with this system.

We hope that our report and the findings of this investigation can be used in national and international courts as evidence that Russia has turned the abduction of people into a deliberate policy to suppress dissent in occupied territories. For this reason, we developed our research methodology in accordance with the norms of international law.

The International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court define several criteria for "enforced disappearance":

– "the arrest, detention, abduction or any other form of deprivation of liberty";

– the involvement of "agents of the State or persons or groups of persons acting with the authorization, support or acquiescence of the State";

– "a refusal to acknowledge that deprivation of freedom or to give information on the fate or whereabouts of those persons, with the intention of removing them from the protection of the law for a prolonged period of time".

After numerous consultations (with lawyers and experts from the Kharkiv Human Rights Group, the Ukrainian Legal Advisory Group (ULAG), and other organizations), we consider abductions in a broad sense. This includes both classic enforced disappearances and holding people incommunicado. Both categories meet the criteria for abduction.

Moreover, in accordance with the norms of international humanitarian law and the Fourth Geneva Convention, which protect the civilian population during occupation, we classify incidents as abductions, even if we have not been able to determine who exactly abducted the person – whether it was FSB operatives, "Crimea Self-Defense" militants, police officers, or other individuals – but available evidence enables us to conclude that the abduction was carried out in the interests of the occupying authorities.

We also consider someone to have been abducted if they are detained by Russian law enforcement agencies – most often the FSB, police, or the Investigative Committee – and kept hidden from lawyers and family members for a certain period. During this time, their whereabouts and conditions of detention remain unknown, and they are held incommunicado.

The number of such cases, Russia's evident interest in concealing the facts of the abductions, the targeting of victims, and the extensive involvement of Russian forces in these crimes are all reasons to characterize the abductions in the occupied territories as Russia's state policy and as crimes against humanity.

We conducted numerous face-to-face interviews with released victims of abduction, their relatives, and their lawyers. Unfortunately, most of them requested to remain anonymous for security reasons, and we cannot disclose their names. To verify these interviews, we also analyzed legal documents, primarily inquiries from lawyers, and responses from Russian law enforcement agencies.

"A person resisting the 'special military operation'"

In late July 2022, Hennadiy Lasynskyi, 35-year-old man, arrived at the police station in the village of Velyka Kardashynka, located in the occupied left-bank part of the Kherson region. Until 2014, he had worked for the Ukrainian police, and now came to apply for a job with the Russian police. Unexpectedly, he was detained and severely beaten, including with a stun gun. After that, officers claimed he was hiding explosives and weapons. The weapons cache did exist; it had been set up by Lasynskyi's friend – who now works as a detective for the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine – when he was leaving the occupied territory. Before leaving, this friend had told Lasynskyi about the weapons. How the Russian police found out about this information remains unknown. According to Lasynskyi's father, who lived with him, his son was detained on July 25.

From then until October 2023 Lasynskyi was held incommunicado, and there was no response to any attempts by his lawyer or father to find him. Oleksiy Ladin, his lawyer who was leading the search, was one of five Crimean lawyers who were later stripped of their licenses for representing Crimean Tatars and Ukrainians abducted from the newly occupied territories. In response to all inquiries, Ladin was told that they have the right to held Lasynskyi in custody without a court order as "a person opposing a special military operation." It was impossible to find out anything else – neither where Lasynskyi was being held, nor his condition or status.

Later, it was revealed that Lasynskyi had been "arrested" by a so-called Extraordinary Commission formed by the occupying Military-Civilian Administration due to the absence of a court in Kherson, which was occupied at that time. The commission extended his "arrest" several times. Ultimately, the Crimean "Supreme Court" refused to consider the lawyer's appeal because the "arrest" had been authorized by a dubious organization created during the occupation.

In October 2023, Lasynskyi was transferred to Crimea, to the recently opened Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2 in Simferopol, where most of the detainees were abducted Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war. Only after that his whereabouts were established by his lawyers and family. Lasynskyi spent fifteen months in captivity.

His case was heard by the Pervomaisky District Court of Crimea. Lasynskyi pleaded guilty and was sentenced to three years, which he had already served almost in full by that time. After his release, he was sent – with an expired Ukrainian passport – to a migration camp for foreigners in the Rostov region. He managed to arrange for his deportation via Georgia, where his trail was lost.

Lasynskyi's case is a salient example of how the policy of abductions in the occupied territories has changed since Russia's full-scale invasion. Almost everything that happened to him – his abduction for "opposing the special military operation," his transfer to Crimea, where at that time a new detention center had been opened specifically for people like him, and months spent in incommunicado detention – has been experienced by hundreds of residents of the occupied regions.

A remand detention facility reserved for prisoners of war, abducted civilians and political prisoners

Four years after a mechanism was put into effect, it became known that the Russian authorities had developed this mechanism allowing them to abduct and detain people without a court order on charges of "opposing the special military operation." However, it had already been applied in Lasynskyi's case.

On March 8, 2022, Vladimir Putin signed a "decree" on "the organization of the admission and detention of individuals opposing the special military operation." According to the "decree", a suspect could be sent to a detention center without a court order for any period. The text of this "decree", as well as the "temporary instruction" that supposedly elaborated on it, were not published. Information about them was obtained from responses to lawyers' inquiries regarding the search for abducted individuals, and it is evident that such a mechanism for legalized abductions is being applied very widely.

People who end up in detention often have no legal status. For months, and sometimes years, no charges are brought against them. Meanwhile, they are held in complete isolation with no access to relatives or lawyers.

"It is strange," says one of the Crimean lawyers. "But often, charges are not even brought after interrogations, when a person who has spent many months in a detention center and is ready to sign any documents tells them everything they demand."

Detention periods may vary. The longest known detention is that of Oleksandr Babych, the mayor of Hola Prystan in the Kherson region, who has been held incommunicado for more than four years.

Babych was detained in late March 2022. Prior to that, the mayor had been organizing pro-Ukrainian demonstrations in the city. According to Ivan Moshensky, an employee of the Hola Prystan administration, Russian troops did not initially enter the city. Instead, fighting took place near the Antonivsky Bridge, closer to Kherson. In anticipation of an assault, residents organized local self-defense units and attempted to block streets. They also protested the occupation at meetings until March 28, when Russian military personnel and Rosgvardia troops finally blocked the city, established an occupation administration, and abducted the mayor from his office in the city council building.

As far as it is known, no charges have been brought against Babych. However, he has been isolated, and all inquiries from his lawyers are met with the response that Oleksandr Babych is not among those officially detained. Apparently, he is being held in custody without trial under the same mechanism outlined in Putin's "decree" – as a "person opposing the special military operation." Former prisoners who have since been released, say that after his abduction, Babych was transported to Crimea, where he was held in the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2, and in 2025 he was moved to the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2 in Taganrog. Based on the latest information, he still remains there.

The Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2 in Simferopol, located on the territory of a maximum-security prison at 4 Elevatorny Lane – where Babych was secretly held for several years – was opened in the fall of 2022 specifically for Ukrainian prisoners of war and civilians abducted from the occupied territories. Later, they were joined by Crimean political prisoners. Therefore, the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2, which is formally subordinate to the Federal Penitentiary Service of the Russian Federation (FSIN), was overseen by the FSB from the very beginning. Part of the security staff also consisted of special service agents. The detention center has a capacity of 340 inmates. According to former detainees who were interviewed, living conditions there are much better than in the old and dilapidated Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 1, but at the same time, control is much stricter and isolation from the outside world is much greater.

In 2023, one of the Crimean lawyers representing civilians abducted in occupied Kherson and Melitopol regularly visited the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2 to meet with his clients. On his request, his clients collected a list of individuals who were held incommunicado in the detention center, memorizing their names during roll calls. As a result, they managed to compile a list of more than fifty names and pass it on to the lawyer, who forwarded this list to Ukrainian human rights defenders so they could find the relatives of these individuals.

Apparently, the detention center administration became aware of this, because after that, inmates were referred to by their numbers rather than their names during roll calls. However, this remains one of the ways to search for abducted people in Crimean detention centers.

The conditions in the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2 were initially extremely harsh. After their release, the detainees reported that they were forced to remain on their feet for 16 hours a day. They were forced to listen to, learn, and sing the Russian national anthem and patriotic songs, particularly those from the Soviet era: songs by Oleg Gazmanov and Yaroslav Dronov (SHAMAN), as well as old Soviet songs such as "Katyusha" and "Victory Day."

One of the former detainees, Crimean Tatar Ekrem Krosh, recalled that detention center guards used stun guns to torture prisoners, and when he complained about this to the detention center's chief, Mykola Ryabov, Ryabov responded by repeatedly striking Krosh in the face.

In the detention center, there is almost no informal communication among inmates, unlike in the old, conventional Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 1. However, even there, it was possible to organize searches for the abducted and find them.

A detention facility with painted-over windows

A quite different situation exists in the more secretive Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 8, which opened in Simferopol in the summer of 2023. The first records of the center were found on the State Procurement of the Russian Federation website, where window blinds and office supplies were ordered for the new detention center. However, the detention center's registration date is even earlier, October 2022, that is, at the same time as the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2, which is located in the same building. Rauf Idrisov was listed as the acting chief of the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 8 at the time of registration; he served in that capacity until March 11, 2026. Since then, the detention center has been headed by Anton Panin, who previously worked in the FSB directorate in the Altai Republic.

From the very beginning, the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 8 was designed to hold prisoners in complete isolation. Although it formally remained under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Justice, only FSB officers worked there as guards. Eventually, in July 2025, a law that allowed the FSB to operate its own detention centers went into effect. A few months later, seven detention centers, including the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 8 in Simferopol, were transferred to the special services agency. From that time on, all information about the center, including the name of its chief, was permanently classified. According to our information, Anton Panin has remained in that position.

The Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2 also underwent leadership changes. In 2023, the center's first chief, Mykola Ryabov, was detained in connection with a bribery case involving the Crimean Department of the Federal Penitentiary Service. According to the prosecution, the leadership of the department and the detention center received kickbacks from an online store in St.Petersburg that delivered packages and letters to the center. Ryabov was ultimately found guilty but received only 10 months in prison. Anton Gorkun then took over as the chief of the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2.

At first, it is difficult to understand how two detention centers can be housed in a single building. However, according to our information, the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 2 occupies the first and second floors – cells 9 through 40 – while the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 8 occupies the third and fourth floors – cells 41 through 73 on the third floor and cells 74 through 95 on the fourth floor.

One of the Crimean detainees, who spent some time in the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 8, said on condition of anonymity that the abducted people were held on the third floor. Of the twelve cells, one was reserved exclusively for abducted women, even though the detention center officially has no women's section. The detainee recalled that during his stay there were four women being held incommunicado in that cell.

Abductees who are held in the pretrial detention centers are called "the chargless." Once criminal charges are brought against them, they are transferred to cells on the other side of the same third floor. For example, the cell of the detainee who reported this incident held two former abductees. One abductee had spent a year in incommunicado detention, and the other one had spent a year and a half.

In the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 8, there is literally no access to daylight. All the windows are covered with a thick layer of paint, and it is impossible even to tell what time it is. The guards, who are FSB officers, including special forces, treat the detainees, some of whom have not been charged with any crimes, in their usual manner. Detainees are forced to walk in the "swallow" position, with their hands behind their backs and bent very low toward the floor. The radio plays constantly and very loudly in the detention center. The sound of propaganda broadcasts and patriotic songs has become another form of pressure.

A former prisoner from the Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 8 called it the "Lefortovo branch" because the FSB had complete control over it. This control was exerted not by the Crimean branch, but by the central office even before the detention center was officially transferred to the security service in 2025.

House search, abduction and incommunicado detention

On January 26, 2024, the home of Ismail Shemshedinov, a Crimean Tatar massage therapist and rehabilitation specialist, was searched. FSB officers conducted the search and took Shemshedinov with them. His mother, Elzara Abibullaeva, was assured that her son would return within three days. This was especially concerning because he was taken away in a tracksuit and not allowed to put on warmer clothes.

Ismail's family waited several days, but he never showed up. Then they began a search that lasted a year. They contacted all law enforcement agencies and searched every detention center in Crimea. Everywhere, they were told that Shemshedinov had not been detained. In the meantime, Ismail was being held in complete isolation in cell No. 44 on the third floor of the secret Pre-Trial Detention Center No. 8.

He spent almost a year incommunicado in that cell, cut off from his family and his lawyer, who continued to search for him. Every day, he was forced to sing the Russian national anthem. With no care packages and personal belongings, he spent the entire year wearing the same underwear and constantly washing it.

In the spring of 2025, Shemshedinov was finally charged with treason. According to the investigation, he collected data on the locations of military units, Russian National Guard bases, and oil depots in Crimea, and passed this information on to the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine. Shemshedinov was allowed to see a lawyer and meet with his family only after the criminal case was opened. In July 2025, the Supreme Court of Crimea sentenced him to 13 years in prison. The year Shemshedinov spent in isolation was not included in the sentence because he was not formally detained or registered at the detention center.

Since the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Shemshedinov's abduction has become a typical case in Crimea, which follows a standard pattern: a house search, abduction, and detention incommunicado in a system of secret pretrial detention centers, all without a court order. At the same time, no information is provided to either the lawyer or the family. Shemshedinov was abducted for over a year, but according to our data, the average detention period for all abducted individuals in Crimea since the full-scale invasion is 2–8 months.

Furthermore, according to our estimates, since the beginning of 2022 nearly 45% of abducted individuals in Crimea are Crimean Tatars. They are being persecuted for their involvement in Hizb ut-Tahrir (an Islamic party that is banned in Russia but operates freely in Ukraine and most European countries), the Noman Chelebidzhihan Battalion (a volunteer Crimean Tatar unit formed in late 2015 to participate in the blockade of Crimea), and on other charges. Their abductions usually do not last long and are used to exert pressure, extract "confessions," and break them psychologically.

In cases where we can make an educated guess about the reasons for the arrest, about 30% of detainees were later charged with treason and espionage. Among them are also people charged with making money transfers to the Armed Forces of Ukraine, providing data about various sites on the peninsula, and generally supporting Ukraine. Another 15% of abducted persons are being prosecuted for anti-war activities and displaying Ukrainian symbols, ranging from posting flyers in support of Ukraine to purchasing military-themed stamps.

Overall, according to the Mnemonic team's estimates, at least 94 people were abducted in Crimea between the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the end of 2025. However, this figure only includes individuals whose names have been verified, so the actual number is in all likelihood much higher.

This publication was produced with the financial support of the Czech organization People in Need, within the framework of the SOS Ukraine initiative, and supported in part by a grant from the Open Society Foundations. The contents of this publication do not necessarily reflect the position of People in Need or the Open Society Foundations.

Anton Naumliuk