Who will stop the “State Department of Torture”?! STATEMENT

02 June 2009
ANOTHER SUICIDE IN THE BILA TSERKVA CORRECTIONAL COLONY No. 35.
Who will stop the “State Department of Torture”?!
The Vinnytsia Human Rights Group is once again forced to report an extraordinary incident that the leadership of the State Department of Ukraine for the Execution of Sentences is trying to hide. According to our information, on the morning of 02 June 2009, a convict of the Bila Tserkva Correctional Colony No. 35, Dmytro Volodymyrovych Ostafiichuk, committed suicide. According to information we were able to obtain illegally, which we have no opportunity to verify, the convict resorted to suicide after a conflict with colony employees and threats from their side. According to eyewitnesses of the suicide, Mr. Ostafiichuk left a suicide note explaining the circumstances of his act, but it was taken by administration employees, who now deny the existence of the note. Currently, Dmytro Ostafiichuk’s body has been taken from the colony in an unknown direction; it is likely that it may be in the premises of the Bila Tserkva morgue. Although the suicide of convicts who are under the complete control and care of the state is an emergency event that requires immediate informing of the public, the State Department of Ukraine for the Execution of Sentences is in no hurry to report the tragedy. No information about this tragedy is present on the DDVP website.
Earlier, the Vinnytsia Human Rights Group reported that the administration of colony No. 35 unlawfully failed to ensure the provision of antiretroviral therapy to an HIV-infected convict, [Sh.] Andrii Oleksandrovych (born 13/04/1969), and to other convicts who are making complaints about slave labour and degrading treatment by the administration. Currently, we have information that, under public pressure, the convict [Sh.] has begun receiving treatment since mid-May, but the situation remains difficult regarding other HIV-infected convicts.
The Vinnytsia Human Rights Group appeals to the Human Rights Commissioner of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine with a request to send representatives of the Commissioner’s Secretariat to participate, together with the public, in the investigation of the circumstances of the suicide of convict Ostafiichuk and the complaints coming from the convicts of BCC No. 35. We ask journalists to actively cover the emergency event in BCC No. 35.
Suicides and self-mutilation by convicts driven to despair testify to the complete professional bankruptcy of the leadership of the Ukrainian penitentiary system, which is not for nothing called the “State Department of Torture” by the people. Despite the fact that responsibility for the activities of the penitentiary system leadership lies personally with the President of Ukraine, who by law appoints and dismisses the Head of the State Penal Service, we call on the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, together with the opposition government, to immediately intensify activities to create effective national preventive mechanisms against torture in accordance with Ukraine’s international obligations.