A body returned without name, mutilated, unrecognizable. A bureaucratic label, “Nm Spas 757”, who hid what was instead the symbol of a war that is also fought against those looking for the truth. So she returned to Ukraine Viktoriia Roshchynathe young journalist who disappeared in the summer of 2023 while investigating torture in the territories occupied by the Russians. His destiny, revealed only by the tenacity of colleagues and family members, has become the emblem of the brutality suffered by those who dare to tell what should not be seen.
The disappearance and mission of Viktoriia
VICTORIIA ROSHHCHYNA, 27 years old, reporters for newspapers like Ukrainska Pravda And Hromadskehe was known among his colleagues for his determination and for the will to go where nobody had the courage to go. He had already been arrested for a first time by Russian FSB in March 2022, but had only returned home after recording a forced “confession” video. Despite the recommendations of colleagues and father, war veteran, Viktoriia had decided to return to the occupied territories, convinced that it was his duty to give voice to the Ukrainians who remained under Russian control.
In July 2023, he left for the last mission. It crosses Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and finally enters Russia, passing the border to Gfulka. I rent an apartment in Enerhodar, near the Zaporizhzia nuclear power plant, and begins to collect testimonies. Use multiple phones, sends files that self -destruct, takes every possible precaution. But On August 3, every trace of her is lost: her phone goes off and her father, failing to contact her anymore, launches the alarm.
© YouTube channel Viktoriia Project
The imprisonment: torture, silences and lies
Viktoriia is brought to Melitopol, where according to the witnesses it undergoes torture in the so -called “garage”, a sorting center for prisoners. Violence are systematic: electric shocks, barrels, food deprivation. Then the transfer to the Sizo-2 prison of Taganrog, in the south of Russia, sadly known for the inhuman conditions to which both civil and Ukrainian soldiers are subjected. Here the prisoners are forced to painful positions, the food is rated, torture continues. Viktoriia stops eating, loses weight to 30 kilos. A cell companion remembers his terrified eyes, the mind now broken by horror.
Only in April 2024, after months of silence, the Russian authorities and the international red cross confirm the arrest of Viktoriia. The father manages to talk to them on the phone for a few minutes, trying to convince her to feed. Then, on October 10, the official communication arrives: Viktoriia died in prison. The Russian authorities even deny that he has ever been held in Taganrog.
The return of the body and the truth about torture
On February 14, 2025, during an exchange of bodies between Russia and Ukraine, there is a corpse labeled as “unidentified male” among the corpses. Ukrainian forensic exams establish that it is a woman, and the DNA test confirms with 99% probability that it is Viktoriia Roshchyna. The body is mummified, almost unrecognizable, but the signs of torture are evident: broken ribs, neck wounds, abrasions and bruises on the whole body, possible traces of electric shocks on the feet. There are no different internal organs – brain, eyes, part of the trachea – probably removed to hide the causes of death, perhaps strangulation or suffocation.
According to Yuriy Belousov, head of the war crimes unit of the Ukrainian Public Prosecutor’s Office, the lesions were imposed while Viktoriia was still alive. The father, however, does not resign himself and asks for further analyzes, unable to accept that that tasty body is really that of his daughter.
The international investigation and the request for justice
The story of Viktoriia Roshchyna was reconstructed by an international newspaper consortium – including Washington Post, The Guardian, Ukrainska Pravda, Mondi, Der Spiegel – coordinated by Forbidden Storieswith the “Viktoriia: history of imprisonment and torture suffered by the journalist Roshchyna and thousands of Ukrainians imprisoned by Russia”. The investigation brought to light not only the ordeal of the young reporter, but also that of thousands of Ukrainian civilians illegally detained in Russia, often without formal accusations and without the possibility of communicating with the outside.
The Ukrainian authorities asked for a strong and immediate response from the international community. “The question of the civil hostages kidnapped and detained by Russia requires greater international attention and an immediate and strong responseSaid the spokesman for the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, Georgiy Tykhy.
The return of the bodies: the testimony of the Kyiv Independent
The case of Viktoriia is part of a wider context of returning bodies of Ukrainian citizens who died in Russian imprisonment. According to an investigation by Kyiv IndependentUkraine has so far recovered the bodies of 757 fallen soldiers, often in conditions similar to those of Roshchyna: mutilated, unrecognizable, without organs. The article tells how the identification process is long and painful, and how many families still await news of their loved ones.
«Bodies returned from Russia often come into conditions such as to make identification difficult, if not impossible. In many cases there are no documents, personal effects or even parts of the body. The Ukrainian authorities rely on DNA tests and forensic analysis to return a name and a story to those who have been deprived of everything, even of dignity in death ». The work of the Kyiv Independent He underlines how the return of the bodies is only the first step towards justice and memory. Each body, each returned name, is a testimony of human rights violations and the need for an international investigation on the conditions of the Ukrainian prisoners in Russia.
A symbol and an open question
The story of Viktoriia Roshchyna is not only that of a young courageous journalist, but the Paradigm of a war that is also fought against information and truth. His sacrifice, made public thanks to the international investigation and the determination of colleagues, asks a question to European and world consciousness: how much will the civilian civilian civilians and reporters have yet to suffer before the international community intervenes decisively?
