Russian human rights commissioner says she doesn't believe in Moscow's ‘secret torture prison,’ but says they exist in Ukraine

Tatyana Moskalkova, Russia’s human rights commissioner, announced at a public forum on Wednesday that she doesn’t believe in the existence of a “secret torture prison” operated by the Federal Security Service, referring to a recent investigative report by Ilya Rozhdestvensky that appeared on the news site Republic.

The story was doubly controversial because the news agency RBC originally rejected it for publication, leading to allegations of censorship, just a month after the outlet was sold to a new owner.

Moskalkova said that she hasn’t received a single formal complaint about any secret prison outside Moscow, adding that she does believe such facilities exist in Ukraine because she’s been approached by mothers who claim their sons have been abducted and taken there.

According to Rozhdestvensky’s report, five men accused of terrorism and murder say Russian federal agents tortured them in a “secret prison” outside Moscow before they were ever formally detained. One suspect says he was electrocuted and waterboarded.