Ukraine demands Red Cross visit Olenivka prison

A satellite photo taken on July 30 provided by Maxar Technologies of the Olenivka detention centre in eastern Donetsk province. The photo was taken after an attack on the prison reportedly killed Ukrainian soldiers captured in May after the fall of Mariupol. Maxar Technologies

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused the Swiss-run International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) of inaction in upholding the rights of Ukrainian prisoners of war and urged it to conduct a mission to a notorious camp in the Russian-occupied east of the country.

On Thursday night, Zelensky said the ICRC had yet to visit Olenivka – a notorious camp in eastern Ukraine under the control of Russian-backed authorities in Donesk and where dozens of Ukrainian POWs died in an explosion and fire in July.

“I don’t understand why the Red Cross mission has not yet arrived in Olenivka. We just can’t waste more time. Human lives are at stake,” Andriy Yemak, Zelensky’s chief of staff, tweeted late on Thursday, announcing that the Ukrainian government had given the ICRC a three-day ultimatum to launch a mission or Kyiv authorities would do it themselves.

“The Red Cross has obligations, primarily of a moral nature. The mandate of the Red Cross must be fulfilled. It is necessary to immediately do what is entirely logical for the Red Cross.”

“There is Olenivka, a concentration camp where our prisoners of war are kept. Access to them must be provided as it was agreed. The Red Cross can make it happen. But you have to try to make it happen. Ukraine is ready to facilitate this.”

ICRC ‘frustration’

In reply, the ICRC said it wanted to see “thousands” of Ukrainian and Russian prisoners of war and shared the “frustration” over the lack of access.

“We cannot enter by force,” ICRC spokesman Ewan Watson told the Keystone-SDA news agency on Friday.

Since the outbreak of the war in Ukraine in February, the ICRC has been able to visit hundreds of detainees. But there are many more.

“Our teams have been ready for months,” Watson added. “We need practical arrangements with the parties.”

Last month, ICRC Director-General Robert Mardini said talks were ongoing with Russian authorities about access to Olenivka – but were eventually denied.

“We are negotiating every day to have full access to all prisoners-of-war,” he told reporters. “It is clearly an absolute obligation [of] the parties to give the ICRC access to all prisoners-of-war.”

More than 50 Ukrainian POWs were killed in the attack at the Olenivka camp in July – many of them soldiers who had defended the Azovstal steel mill in Mariupol before giving themselves up.

Ukraine accused Russia of blowing up barracks to cover up what they said was torture and killing of prisoners. Russian authorities said a Ukrainian missile caused the explosion.