10/01/2022 12:00

Commissioner: a citizen of Ukraine Bohdan Maksymenko, who is illegally detained in the Western Correctional Colony № 97 in the ORDO, has a congenital heart defect

Citizen of Ukraine Bohdan Maksymenko, who is illegally detained in the Western Correctional Colony № 97 in the temporarily occupied territory of Donetsk region, has a congenital heart defect and his condition is deteriorating day by day. This was announced by the Commissioner for Human Rights of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Lyudmyla Denisova.

The Ombudsman reminded that on April 10, 2020, 20-year-old Bohdan was visited by people in military uniform without identification. After searches, they confiscated equipment and took the boy away. For 73 days his family did not know his whereabouts.

It was later revealed that Bohdan was in Makeyevka, in the pre-trial detention center of the so-called "Ministry of State Security of the ORDO", which is located on the territory of the G97 colony. All days the boy was without vital drugs, despite having a group II disability due to congenital heart disease: critical valvular and subvalvular stenosis of the pulmonary artery, hypertrophy and dilatation of the right ventricle, dilatation of the right atrium, tricuspid valve insufficiency. He is not provided with qualified medical care in the penitentiary institution.

Bohdan never hid his civic position and condemned Russia's aggression against Ukraine. A month before the detention, he wrote a post on Facebook: "There are things for which you can endure everything, because there are us - Ukrainians and there is our great family - our whole Ukraine."

The occupying authorities accuse Bohdan of several articles, including "calls for extremist activities."

"Such actions against the citizen of Ukraine Bohdan Maksymenko are violations not only of Ukrainian law but also of international law, including the Geneva Conventions of 1949 on the Rules of War, the Additional Protocols to the Geneva Conventions of 1977 and the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms people of 1950 ", - Lyudmila Denisova emphasized.

The Commissioner appealed to the ICRC leadership in Ukraine to urgently visit Bohdan Maksymenko, facilitate his immediate hospitalization and provide qualified medical care. She also asked the OSCE Coordinator in the humanitarian subgroup of the Tripartite Contact Group, Charlotte Relander, to intervene personally to provide appropriate assistance.

Given the critical state of health of Bohdan Maksymenko, the Ombudsman insists on his immediate release.