Leonid Kondratskyi

Leonid Kondratskyi

Date of disappearance: October 17, 2022

Place of disappearance: Nova Kakhovka, Kherson region

Leonid Kondratskyi worked as the head of municipal security in Nova Kakhovka, Kherson region. After the start of the full-scale invasion and occupation of the city, the Russians abducted him three times. The first time was in late February 2022. The invaders illegally held Leonid for ten days, handcuffing him to a radiator in the building of the Novokakhovka City Council, and then took him to Kherson. In early April of the same year, Russian soldiers illegally searched Leonid’s family home when he was not at home. The house was surrounded by armored personnel carriers, guns were pointed at the family, phones and computers were checked, and even Leonid’s 14-year-old granddaughter was interrogated. Kondratskyi’s daughter Iryna assumes that these were not Russians, but collaborators, because they spoke Ukrainian well.

A few days later, on April 14, the occupiers kidnapped Leonid for the second time and kept him in the basement of the Novokakhovka police department for 17 days along with other civilian prisoners. The man was tortured there.

— They did not let him sleep, he was very beaten. His leg was swollen. The Russians pressured him to sign a cooperation agreement with them. They pressured him because of his children,” Iryna recalls.

Six months later, on October 17, 2022, Kondratskyi was abducted for the third time. He was held in the building of the Novokakhovka SSU office, and later one of the occupiers reported that Leonid had been taken to Crimea. The Russians officially confirmed to the ICRC that they were holding Leonid. In January 2023, Kondratsky wrote his daughter a letter saying he was waiting for an exchange. Six months later, it became known that Leonid was being held in Simferopol’s Detention Center #2. He was accused of “international terrorism”. The man was taken to Kamyshyn, Volgograd region in February of the same year. During his time in Russian captivity, Leonid lost almost 40 kilograms. Iryna has not received any letters from her father for about two years.

This publication was compiled with the support of the International RenaissanceFoundation. It’s content is the exclusive responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily reflect the views of the International Renaissance Foundation.