About 600 people are being held hostage by the occupiers in the Kherson region.
This was reported by the Permanent Representative of the President of Ukraine to the Autonomous Republic of Crimea Tamila Tasheva, Interfax-Ukraine reports.
According to her, most of them are journalists and public activists.
«According to our information, in the Kherson region about 600 people are actually hostages and are in specially equipped basements, in fact, torture chambers… In Kherson, in these basements, there are, according to our information, about 300 people, the rest - in the Kherson region», Tasheva said.
She noted that these are public activists who organized pro-Ukrainian rallies in Kherson and the region, as well as were responsible for communication with large groups of people.
Tasheva added that the hostages were being held in inhumane conditions and subjected to torture.
«Witnesses report screaming heard while passing by places where such illegal activities take place against our citizens», Tasheva said.
She added that some of the hostages were being taken from the Kherson region to the temporarily occupied Crimea.
«This is the Simferopol pre-trial detention facility and Sevastopol. There are both civilian hostages and, according to our information, there are prisoners of war. Or some of the people leaving Mariupol were also detained and taken to the Simferopol pre-trial detention facility during filtering activities at the administrative border with Crimea», Tasheva noted.
In the Kherson region, the russian military disguises itself as the Ukrainian Armed Forces and visits the homes of residents to identify Ukrainian activists and patriots.
According to the head of the region, the occupiers kidnapped more than 120 residents.