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Two new Russian pretrial detention centers in occupied Crimea form part of a system in which Ukrainian civilians are held for months without formal charges, access to lawyers, or family contact.

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Russia’s Federal Penitentiary Service formally operates one of the new facilities, Pretrial Detention Center No. 2 (SIZO No. 2) in Simferopol, but testimony gathered by the Kyiv Independent indicates the FSB has special access to it. The other facility, SIZO No. 8, officially came under FSB control in March 2026, and information about its head was classified.

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Former detainees told the Kyiv Independent that their relatives sometimes did not know whether their abducted loved ones were still alive.

“I didn’t even have time to work out how many of them there were. They immediately beat me, blindfolded me with plastic wrap, and restrained me. That’s how my ‘business trip’ began.”

His captors held him in makeshift torture sites in southern Ukraine, where they gave him electric shocks, choked him, poured water over his face, pulled out his fingernails, and burned his fingers and ears. They forced him to name the people he had been in contact with in Ukraine. Anatolii suspected that Russian police and FSB officers were among his interrogators and torturers. After some time, they gave him documents to sign.

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“They would put papers on the table and show me where to sign,” he [an imprisoned civilian] said. “Once, I lifted my head slightly to see the title of a document. They immediately hit me and shoved a pistol against my back below my shoulder blade. After that, I knew I wouldn’t lift my head again. I don’t know what I signed.”

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Former detainees interviewed by the Kyiv Independent said guards watched them constantly, denied them adequate medical care, never turned off the lights in their cells, and allowed them to wash for just five minutes once a week. Those who did not finish in time were forced to run back to their cells naked and were shocked with stun guns. Guards set dogs on the prisoners, forced them to learn the Russian national anthem, and beat them constantly.

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Unlike prisoners of war, who are regularly returned through exchanges, civilians effectively remain without a functioning mechanism for their return. According to estimates by Ukraine’s human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets, Russia unlawfully holds about 16,000 Ukrainian civilians in about 200 detention sites in Russia and occupied parts of Ukraine. Only a few hundred people have been brought back.

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