The United Nations has released a report detailing what it calls a “shocking pattern” of sexual violence committed by Russian troops in Ukraine, documenting more than 1,000 cases since the full-scale invasion began in February 2022. The findings, published on Friday by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, describe abuses that amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity under international law.
According to the report, the documented cases involve victims as young as four and as old as 82. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, expressed deep alarm at the prevalence of these acts, stating: “I am deeply alarmed by the prevalence of these abhorrent acts documented in our report, and fear that they are almost certainly continuing amid the unceasing violence we are witnessing every day in Ukraine.”
The report attributes 89% of the 1,004 cases to Russian forces. While the majority of victims are men, particularly those held in detention, women and children have suffered most severely in occupied territories. Crimes against Ukrainian prisoners of war and detained medical personnel include gang rape, genital mutilation, and other forms of sexual humiliation.
Methods of abuse
The most common single method recorded was the use of a Soviet-era military field telephone, known as a “tapik,” to administer electric shocks to the genitals. This form of abuse was used in 155 cases, or 27% of the total. Survivor testimonies also describe prisoners of war being sexually assaulted with objects such as batons, cell door keys, and shovel handles.
Individual accounts are harrowing. In Zaporizhzhia, a woman was raped several times a week for a month by a Russian soldier who promised better treatment for her detained husband. In Kherson, a woman was assaulted nightly and repeatedly threatened with gang rape. In the Kyiv region, two Russian soldiers broke into a family home in 2022, shot and killed a woman’s husband, and then gang-raped her, threatening to shoot her in front of her four-year-old son if she resisted.
Türk stressed that sexual violence is a grave feature of the armed attack against Ukraine and must stop immediately, irrespective of the perpetrators. He added: “Given the high prevalence of cases attributed to its forces, however, the Russian Federation in particular must take concrete and discernible steps to protect civilians and prisoners of war from all forms of torture, including sexual violence.”
The 20-page report covers the period from 24 February 2022 to the end of July 2026 and draws on confidential interviews with hundreds of victims, along with court documents and official records. Of the 11% of cases attributed to Ukrainian forces, nearly half involved threats of sexual violence against Russian prisoners of war and prisoners of war from third countries. The remainder included forced nudity, electric shocks, beatings to the genitals, sexually degrading treatment, and two cases each of sexual assault and attempted rape.
International response
Russia was added to the UN Secretary-General’s list of parties credibly suspected of committing sexual violence in conflict in May of this year, a list that includes Sudan, Somalia, and Haiti as repeat offenders. The Kremlin rejected the findings as politically motivated.
The UN Human Rights Council’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine has separately documented widespread use of torture by Russian authorities against Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war in occupied territory and inside Russia. Russia formally withdrew from the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture in September 2025, following its expulsion from the Council of Europe, ending visits by European monitors to Russian detention facilities. Russia remains a formal party to the UN Convention Against Torture and prohibits torture under its constitution and criminal code.
The Ukrainian foreign ministry welcomed the report, saying it had “once again demonstrated the scale of systematic human rights violations committed by the Russian Federation.” Rape and sexual violence were codified as war crimes and crimes against humanity under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which entered into force in 2002.
The report comes amid ongoing Russian strikes across Ukraine that continue to kill and wound civilians, and as European leaders debate responses to Russian aggression, including energy security measures. The findings also underscore the urgency of international financial support for Ukraine as it defends itself against such atrocities.
