Ukraine on Tuesday said it arrested the former head of a notorious separatist prison camp, dubbed "the executioner" by the media after years of alleged torture.
Kiev announced the arrest of 37-year-old Denys Kulykovsky, with its SBU security service saying he organised the "murders and tortures of illegally detained people" in the separatist capital, Donetsk.
Kiev has fought pro-Moscow separatists in its eastern regions since 2014, when Russia annexed its Crimea peninsula.
Kulykovsky allegedly ran the "Izolyatsia" prison camp in the separatist capital Donetsk between 2015 and 2018. It was set up by rebels in a former art centre on the premises of an abandoned factory in the city.
Thousands went through the detention centre.
Charged with war crimes and creating an illegal armed group, Kulykovsky faces up to fifteen years behind bars.
In a July report, the UN said detainees in separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine were routinely tortured. .
It said it was concerned by what it called systemic "torture and ill-treatment" at the Izolyatsia prison and other detention sites in separatist-held territory.
Ukrainian journalist Stanislav Aseyev who spent more than two years at Izolyatsia described Kulykovsky as a "psychopathic sadist" who subjected detainees to "rape" and "torture".
Aseyev, released from the camp in December 2019, said Kulykovsky also practised electric shock on detainees.
The conflict between Kiev and pro-Moscow separatists has claimed more than 13,000 lives.
Ukraine and its Western allies accuse Russia of sending troops and arms across the borders. Moscow has denied those claims.
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