The fact that the FSB concealed the whereabouts of Tetiana Maliar, her brother and adult son and daughter for a week after they were taken away is likely to mean that they were subjected to torture
FSB ’detention’ in occupied Crimea FSB material, reposted by Crimean Realities
FSB ’detention’ in occupied Crimea FSB material, reposted by Crimean Realities
Russia’s FSB have yet again targeted several members of one family, with the four Ukrainians seized over a week ago including a mother of two small children. Very little information is currently available, but the FSB’s concealment of their whereabouts for a week makes publicity vital. Such periods, where a person is held incommunicado, without any legal status or independent lawyer, are typically used to extract ‘confessions’ through torture.
Refat Chubarov, Chair of the Crimean Tatar Mejlis, reported on 30 March that ‘searches’ of four homes had been carried out during the night from 21 to 22 March 2025 in Yevpatoria, with four people ‘detained: Tetiana Maliar (b. 1968); Tetiana’s brother Valentyn Maliar (b. 1974); her son Anatoliy Rossikhin (b. 1986) and her daughter Olha Behei (b. 1992). Olha was taken away, despite having two underage children: Alisa, who is 11 and 7-year-old Ruslan.
The four relatives’ whereabouts were concealed for a week. It is now clear that they are held in SIZO-2, one of the remand prisons in occupied Simferopol which Russia created after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The prison is known to be under the control of the FSB and to be used for Russia’s ever-mounting number of political prisoners. The four appear to be accused of activities which the FSB are claiming fall under ‘state treason’, Article 275 of Russia’s criminal code. The charge, if confirmed, means that all four have Russian passports, but little more, given that Russia has essentially made it impossible to live on occupied territory without taking such citizenship.
There has been a massive increase in Russia’s use of ‘treason’ charges since its full-scale invasion, with the links below just to the latest of many horrific sentences. Most of these ‘trials’ involve claims that the Ukrainian passed information to Ukraine’s Security Service or Military Intelligence about the movements of the Russian invaders on illegally occupied Ukrainian territory. There is no way of verifying such claims, and no real need since Russia, as occupying state, is prohibited by international law, from applying its legislation on occupied territory. Other pretexts for bringing ‘treason’ charges are even more surreal, with several Ukrainians facing or having already been sentenced to long terms of imprisonment for a small donation to Ukraine’s Armed Forces or charities helping victims of Russia’s war against Ukraine.
The fact that Tetiana Maliar, her brother and children, were held incommunicado for a full week is especially chilling given the secrecy around all such ‘treason or treason through spying trials’ which are held behind closed doors. Those detained are usually placed under enormous pressure to reject independent lawyers, and even where such lawyers are present, they are forced to sign non-disclosure agreements. These methods are almost always aimed at ensuring that the ‘defendants’ do not retract ‘confessions’ given under torture, and do not describe in court the methods, including torture through electric shocks and savage beatings, that they endured.
Friends of Tetiana Maliar and the others have told Chubarov that it is possible they were targeted by the FSB because they are originally from Lviv, in Western Ukraine.
Russia is also increasingly using ‘terrorism’ or ‘extremism’ charges against Ukrainians for peaceful protest against Russia’s war of aggression or even criticism on social media. Valery Shevchuk was recently sentenced to five years’ imprisonment over comments critical of Russia’s army that he made on YouTube. Yevpatoria street artist Bohdan Ziza has been imprisoned since May 2022, and is serving a 15-year sentence on insane ‘terrorism’ charges over a protest against the war in which he daubed paint in the colours of the Ukrainian flag and threw a Molotov cocktail at an occupation administration building.
A particular sinister part of Russia’s terror is the use of ‘**Crimean SMERSH’** vigilantes to hunt out, threaten and terrorise Ukrainians who express criticism of the war or demonstrated pro-Ukrainian views. Although Crimean SMERSH is officially the creation of collaborator Aleksandr Talipov and ‘a civic organization’, it works in very close cooperation with the occupation enforcement bodies. This echo from Soviet times is also now being set up, with the same aims, in other occupied parts of Ukraine.
See also:
Vladyslav AfanasievCrimean sentenced to 15 years for donation to rescue children from Russian-occupied territory
Nina Tymoshenko Russia’s most savage sentence yet against 66-year-old Ukrainian woman from occupied Crimea
Lera DzhemilovaRussia concocts ‘treason’ charges eight months after abducting young Crimean woman
Oksana Senedzhuk 58-year-old Sevastopol activist sentenced to 15 years for opposing Russia’s war against Ukraine
Liudmyla Kolesnikova Russian FSB abduct Ukrainian from her mother’s funeral in occupied Crimea