Photography by Nataliya Gumenyuk / X Courtesy of The Kyiv Independent

At just 27, Ukrainian journalist Viktoriia Roshchyna had built a reputation for courageous, frontline reporting – shedding light on Russia’s secret prison transfers, “black sites,” and the abuses behind them. As a freelance journalist, Roshchyna worked for several news outlets including Ukrainska Pravda, Hromadske, and RFE/RL. She had been recognized for her war coverage by the International Women’s Media Foundation.

In August 2023, during a reporting trip to Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine near Zaporizhzhia, she disappeared. Before being captured herself, she had been compiling a list of Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) agents responsible for the detention and torture of Ukrainian civilians.

Less than two years later, her body was returned to Ukraine – bearing the marks of atrocity. What Russian authorities claimed was “body number 757,” labeled as “unidentified male” and marked “SPAS,” was confirmed to be Roshchyna. Her remains were missing her brain, eyes, and larynx – likely to hide the torture she suffered, according to an investigation.

Forensic examinations revealed bruises, hemorrhages, a broken rib, possible electrocution marks, and neck injuries – including signs consistent with strangulation. The exact cause of death remains unresolved even after further expert review. Roshchyna endured at least four months of torment. First held in Melitopol, where she was tortured incommunicado, before being transferred to Russia’s Taganrog pretrial facility, infamously described as “hell on earth” by Human Rights Watch. Former detainees and cellmates described that Victoria suffered from scars from knife injuries, repeated electrocution, emotional collapse, and starvation. In late August, more than a year after her disappearance, Roshchyna briefly called her father – and said, “I was promised that I would be home in September… get ready to meet me.” By then, she was already dead.

Victoria’s death is an emblem of Russia’s atrocities of silencing truth-tellers through enforced disappearance, secret detention, and violence. International community condemned it as a blatant breach of the Geneva Conventions and the UN Convention Against Torture.

Pattern of Silencing Truth

Around 28 Ukrainian journalists have been imprisoned in Russia on criminal charges since February 2022. Many face accusations of extremism and terrorism. Most were arrested in occupied territories and are being targeted for their independent coverage of the Russian invasion.

Western journalists haven’t been spared either. Wall Street Journal correspondent Evan Gershkovich was sentenced to 16 years on espionage charges, and RFE/RL journalist Alsu Kurmasheva received six-and-a-half years for “fake news.” UN experts condemned these sentences as sham trials aimed at warning all journalists of the price of speaking truth to power. This court was nothing more than a mockery of justice. After complex negotiations, Alsu Kurmasheva was released from Russian custody and returned to the United States in a historic prisoner exchange on August 1, 2024. Alsu reunited with her family, alongside Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, detained by the Kremlin for 16 months.

Reporting from within Russia has become increasingly challenging, as journalists and media outlets frequently face silencing due to laws that criminalize independent coverage. In February 2025, four independent Russian journalists: Antonina Favorskaya, Konstantin Gabov, Sergey Karelin, and Artyom Kriger received five-and-a-half-year prison terms on extremism charges tied to their work with Navalny’s anti-corruption group. As per usual, all the charges were transparently political.

With targeting target dissident voices, Russia tries to erase accountability and crush dissent under fabricated charges in sealed courts. Cases like Roshchyna’s are extreme and brutal and are one more proof in a countless line of hundreds of thousands of war crimes and atrocities committed by Russia.

Attempts to bury the truth

Russia systematically muzzles independent voices. This brutal crackdown that includes secret detentions, torture, and inhumane treatment has made Russia the third-largest jailer of journalists in the world.

What happened to Viktoriia Roshchyna isn’t an isolated tragedy – it’s an example of Russia’s practices meant to bury the truth and those who sought it. Victoria dared to lift the veil on brutality and found herself behind it instead. But Roshchyna’s story refuses to stay buried. Prosecutors investigate Viktoriia’s death as a war crime. The international investigation into her case, the “Viktoriia Project,” involving 45 journalists across 13 media outlets, gave her back her name and memory for the work she has done and unspeakable cruelty she endured.

Roshchyna’s story is therefore not only about the silencing of one voice. It is evidence in a growing body of international documentation that may one day hold Russian criminals accountable.  The systematic persecution of journalists is not collateral damage of war. It’s a calculated strategy to control the narrative by erasing witnesses. Each investigation, each international appeal, and each refusal to forget names like Viktoriia Roshchyna pushes against the Russia’s criminal machinery of silence.