Ukrainian journalist died after torture in Russian jail

The exchange took place on a lonely forest road in February.

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Moving along a line of refrigerated lorries, the teams in hazmat suits went about their grim work: preparing the remains of 757 Ukrainian military casualties handed over by Russia for the journey back to Kyiv.

Clipboards in hand, intermediaries from the Red Cross checked their lists. For each body shrouded in white plastic, the Russians had provided a number, a name, a location, sometimes a cause of death. And then, at the bottom of the last page, a mystery entry: "NM SPAS 757." The letters were abbreviations, taken to mean "unidentified man" and "extensive damage to the coronary arteries".

It would be weeks before officials could confirm what the Guardian and its reporting partners are publishing today. The unlabelled remains were those of a woman. Not a soldier, either, but one of the most high-profile civilians detained since the full-scale invasion.

The journalist Viktoriia Roshchyna was captured in the summer of 2023 near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station. It was at least her fourth reporting trip into the occupied territories. She was by this stage of the war the only Ukrainian journalist prepared to risk crossing the frontline in order to pierce the information blackout imposed by Russia.

Roshchyna died after a year in detention, aged 27.

Information on the circumstances of her death is limited. Roshchyna was held without charge and without access to a lawyer. During her detention, her only known contact with the outside world was a four-minute phone call to her parents, a full year after she was taken.

Preliminary forensics suggest "numerous signs of torture", according to the prosecutor: burn marks on her feet from electric shocks, abrasions on the hips and head, and a broken rib. Her hair, which she liked to wear long and tinted blonde at the tips, had been shaved.