Russia bears full responsibility for the death in its custody of 60-year-old Rustem Viratti, who should never have been held prisoner.
Rustem Virali
Rustem Virali
60-year-old Rustem Viratti has died in a Russian prison colony two years after he was abducted from his home in occupied Kherson oblast. Virati became one of many Crimean Tatars to be seized from Ukrainian territory occupied after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and sentenced on overtly illegal charges to eight years’ imprisonment. He is one of at least four Ukrainian political prisoners to have died in Russian captivity, however the real number is likely to be much higher. At least one of the political prisoners we know about, Oleksandr Ishchenko, had been savagely tortured, while the very fact that gravely ill Crimean Tatar civic activist Dzhemil Gafarov was ever placed in the horrific conditions of a Russian prison already constituted torture.
It was learned on 12 March that Rustem Viratti had died in a prison colony in Ulyanovsk oblast, a huge distance from his wife, three children and five grandchildren in Ukraine. Rustem Viratti (b. 28.12.1964) was from Rykovo, a small town in Henichesk raion which has been under Russian occupation since 2022.
The Russians first burst into Viratti’s home and carried out a search on 16 March 2023. He was taken away by FSB ‘officers’ who savagely beat him, before leaving him, in the evening, on the road.
The thuggish lawlessness of all this cannot be overstated. Rustem Viratti was arrested the following day, with the charges laid against him based solely on a badge which the FSB had removed from his home the previous day. This stated that Viratti had taken part in the civic blockade of Crimea. This blockade sought to stop business as usual with Crimea while it was under Russian occupation. It was initiated in September 2015 by Crimean Tatar leaders with specifically human rights demands, including Russia’s release of its ever-increasing number of Crimean political prisoners and an end to its crushing of freedom of speech.
Although immensely riling to Russia, there was nothing at all illegal about the blockade, nor about the Noman Çelebicihan Battalion which was founded at the beginning of January 2016 by Crimean Tatar activist and businessman Lenur Islyamov. The Battalion was made up initially by people taking part in the blockade, who largely worked in cooperation with Ukrainian enforcement officers. Despite the name, the Noman Çelebicihan Battalion was a peaceful and unarmed civic organization whose stated objective, namely the liberation of Crimea from Russia’s occupation, was and remains in full accordance with the position of the UN and other international bodies.
Russia began illegally fabricating charges under Russian legislation against Crimean Tatars over alleged involvement in the Battalion back in 2018. Since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, such prosecutions have, however, turned into one of the FSB’s conveyor belts of repression, especially against Crimean Tatars and, sometimes, other Ukrainians abducted from occupied parts of Kherson oblast. The charges are quite staggeringly lawless, with Ukrainian citizens sentenced to long terms of imprisonment for alleged involvement in a legal Ukrainian organization on Ukrainian territory. Despite lack of any jurisdiction, Russia uses its legislation to claim that this is ‘participation in the activities of an unlawful armed formation acting on the territory of a foreign country for purposes which are against the interests of the Russian Federation” under Article 208 § 2 of Russia’s criminal code.
This was the charge laid against Rustem Viratti on 17 March 2023. For four months, his family were not given any information about his whereabouts, and could not pass on vital medication, items of hygiene, food, etc. It was only later discovered that he had been held prisoner in SIZO No. 2 in occupied Chonhar (Kherson oblast) for those four months. occupied Kherson oblast for those four months.
Viratti was sentenced by the occupation ‘Henichesk court’ to eight years in a maximum-security [or literally ‘harsh-regime’] prison colony, with the ‘prosecutor’ having apparently asked for 15 years. The so-called ‘hearings’ all took place behind closed doors, meaning that Rustem’s family were deprived even of that chance of seeing him. He was also denied an independent lawyer, with those individuals appointed by the Russian occupiers typically there only to sign pieces of paper and encourage the person to admit to all the charges.
According to Eskender Bariev, Head of the Crimean Tatar Resources Centre, a friend of Rustem’s caught sight of the political prisoner as he was brought to the ‘court’. Rustem’s bandaged head could well mean that he was still subjected to torture and ill-treatment. He was later moved to Ufi, in Russia and then to a harsh-regime prison colony in Dmitrovgrad.
Rustem Viratti was in good health when taken prisoner. His health began sharply deteriorating in the prison colony. Although some of the symptoms – the increased blood sugar level, the swelling in the legs and fluid in the lungs could, in principle, have developed anywhere, he beating he had received clearly caused damage to his kidneys. It was claimed that he had received insulin while in the prison colony, however, as Bariev notes, there is no way of knowing what he was injected with.
The conditions in Russian penal institutions are appalling and there is little or no access to proper healthcare. The situation is especially bad for Ukrainian political prisoners as prison doctors will, typically, avoid giving truthful diagnosis which would mean that the person was being illegally held in captivity.
The last phone call from Rustem Viratti to his family was on 7 February 2025. He said then that he could not survive long. His family were apparently informed of his death on 10 February, with the Russian authorities even trying to bury him in a common grave. They did finally agree to hand the body over to Rustem’s brother, with the funeral to take place on 13 March.
Rustem Viratti was not a young man, but his death was almost certainly precipitated by the torture he was subjected to and by his illegal imprisonment on fabricated charges.
Russia is equally responsible for the death in captivity of political prisoners Dzhemil Gafarov; Kostiantyn Shyrinh; Viktor Demchenko; Oleksandr Ishchenko and 27-year-old Victoria Roshchyna, whose body Moscow is still hiding. The real list of Ukrainians tortured to death or denied vital healthcare and medication while in Russian captivity is likely to be very much higher. There are also a number of Crimean Tatar and other Ukrainian political prisoners whose state of health means that Russia is directly risking their life by holding them prisoner.