Ukraine will ‘not be silent’ about women being raped during invasion, says MP Maria Mezentseva

Ukraine will “not be silent” about the “horror” of women being raped during the invasion, an MP in the country has warned, saying “justice has to prevail”.

Maria Mezentseva said that while one particularly shocking incident had been “widely discussed” and was being investigated by Ukraine’s prosecutor, they were “expecting many more” victims to come forward.

Ms Mezentseva, who is head of the permanent delegation of Ukraine to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, said details of incidents must be recorded as they happen and that cases were taken “very seriously”.

Speaking to Sky’s Sophy Ridge On Sunday programme from Western Ukraine, she highlighted one incident which had been recorded and proceeded with by the prosecutor’s office.

“We’re not going into details, but it’s quite a scary scene when a civilian was shot dead in his house in a small town next to Kyiv,” she said.

“His wife was – I’m sorry but I have to say it – raped several times in front of her underage child.”

She added: “There are many more victims rather than just this one case which has been made public by the prosecutor general.

“And of course, we are expecting many more of them, which will be public once victims will be ready to talk about that.”

Ukraine will look to other countries, such as the UK, for expertise in how to help victims in the aftermath of war, she said.

“We will definitely not be silent,” she said, adding: “Justice has to prevail, that’s why these cases are taken very seriously.”

Ms Mezentseva said there had also been two incidents reported in the past week where Russian soldiers were accused of shooting at civilians queuing for humanitarian aid.

“This is just an absolute fact of a war crime against (the) Ukrainian civilian population,” she said.

“This is definitely not soldiers against soldiers. This is something which is going beyond the normal understanding of war conduct.”

Earlier this month, Russian troops shot and killed 10 people as they queued up to buy bread in the Ukrainian city of Chernihiv, according to US officials.

The US embassy in Kyiv described the attack on March 16 as “horrific”.