Injured sailors Andry Eider, Vasyl Soroka and Andry Artemchenko need quality treatment and surgery as before

Russian ombudswoman Tatiana Moskalkova states that the state of health of Ukrainian POW sailors is satisfactory; however, the supporting medical documentation is not provided to the Ukrainian side as Ukraine’s ombudswoman Lyudmyla Denisova reported on Facebook.

“I received a response from the Human Rights Commissioner of the Russian Federation Tatiana Moskalkova to my numerous appeals on the Ukrainian POWs. The Russian ombudswoman states that doctors assess the state of health of sailors as satisfactory. But, again, there is no official confirmation in the form of the medical certificate,” the Ukrainian ombudswoman wrote.

She emphasized that injured sailors Andry Eider, Vasyl Soroka and Andry Artemchenko need quality treatment and surgery as before.

Moreover, other Ukrainian sailors need medical service.

“We will continue to insist on the transfer of three injured sailors to the third (neutral) country for the treatment and the further release of all captured sailors according to the Third Geneva Convention “On the treatment of prisoners of war” dated August 12, 1949,” Denisova added.

On November 25, the coast guard ships of the Russian Navy attacked the ships of the Ukrainian Navy, which have been carrying out a scheduled transition from Odesa port to Mariupol port in the Sea of Azov. Ukrainian ships were rejected passage via the Kerch Strait, Russian coast guards opened aimed fire on them.

All 24 sailors on board were captured and delivered to Moscow – 21 of them were delivered to Lefortovo remand center, another - to the hospital of Matrosskaya Tishina prison.

On December 3, the Russian prosecutors officially accused Ukrainian sailors with the 'illegal crossing of the state border' during the attack in the Kerch Strait.

Facing an extension of the sentence term, Ukrainian POWs detained in the Kerch Strait refused to testify in Lefortovo court. Sailors were distributed into six groups, four people in each. On January 15, 2019 Moscow's Lefortovo district court decided to keep 20 Ukrainian sailors in remand until April 24. On January 16, the court extended the detention term for another 4 sailors.

As we reported, lawyer Nikolai Polozov, who deals with the defense of Ukrainian prisoners of war, confirmed that three Ukrainian sailors wounded in the Russian Navy attack on Ukrainian ships were brought from Matrosskaya Tishina to Lefortovo prison in Moscow. He also added that it happened on Monday, January 28.

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