KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The United Nations human rights agency says that prisoners taken by the warring parties in the separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine have endured systematic torture, sexual violence and other abuses. Friday’s report issued by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) noted that prisoners’ abuse was particularly rampant in the initial stage of the seven-year conflict but continues to this day. The OHCHR said that both sides used secret detention facilities immune from any prosecutorial oversight or access by rights monitors. The government side stopped using those facilities in 2017 but separatists continue holding prisoners incommunicado, barring access to their relatives and monitors.
