Arria-formula Meeting on Implementing International Humanitarian Law in Ukraine
On Monday morning (10 August), there will be an Arria-formula meeting titled “Implementing international humanitarian law: prisoners of war, civilian detainees and foreign fighters, in the context of Russia’s war against Ukraine”. Latvia and the UK are organising the meeting, with co-sponsorship from Ukraine.
The anticipated briefers include Claudia Fuentes Julio, Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights and Head of the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in New York; Leniie Umerova, a Crimean Tatar activist and human rights defender who was detained in December 2022 while travelling to Crimea, eventually transferred to Moscow and held on espionage charges before her release in September 2024; Khuan Alberto Leyva Garsiya, a junior sergeant in the Ukrainian Armed Forces, who defended the city of Mariupol and the Azovstal steel plant in 2022 and spent more than three years in Russian captivity before his release in August 2025; Oleg Gushchyn, a Ukrainian lawyer and legal expert with the Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, a Ukrainian governmental body that coordinates state activities related to compliance with the Third and Fourth Geneva Conventions; and Sheida Kiran, a British-Turkish-Iranian documentary filmmaker who recently produced the film “Into the Void: Putin’s Foreign Fighters”, an investigation into the recruitment of foreign nationals to fight in the war.
The meeting, which will begin at 10 am EDT and take place in the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) Chamber, is expected to be broadcast on UNTV.
According to the concept note circulated by the co-organisers, the meeting aims to draw attention to the treatment of Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) and civilian detainees in Russian custody, alleged violations of international humanitarian law (IHL) and international human rights law (IHRL), and what it describes as the deceptive and coercive recruitment of foreign nationals into the Russian armed forces.
The concept note states that POW exchanges are taking place regularly with the support of intermediaries. According to figures cited in the concept note, as at 10 June, Ukraine had secured the return of 9,446 people from Russian captivity, including 457 civilians. Thousands reportedly remain in Russian custody, while Ukraine’s official register of missing persons includes more than 16,000 civilians from territories held by Russia.
UN reporting has documented widespread violations involving Ukrainian POWs and civilian detainees held by Russian authorities, including torture and ill-treatment, conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV), arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance, and executions. The UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine (HRMMU) reported a spike in executions of captured Ukrainian soldiers in November and December 2025. The concept note also refers to a September 2025 HRMMU report which found that among 216 released civilian detainees interviewed since June 2023, 92 percent had given consistent accounts of torture or ill-treatment.
The concept note poses several questions to help guide the discussion, including:
- How can the international community strengthen the implementation of existing international obligations for the protection of civilians and POWs, particularly against torture and ill-treatment, improve access to detainees, and ensure credible investigations and accountability for violations?
- What practical measures can be taken to facilitate exchanges and the return of POWs and civilian detainees?
- How can the international community develop a more coordinated response to the deceptive recruitment of foreign nationals?
Access to detainees is an expected key focus of Monday’s meeting. The concept note cites the 2025 annual report of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), according to which the organisation made 75 visits to 22 places of internment or detention in Ukraine holding 16,580 people and collected or distributed more than 11,835 Red Cross messages. The report did not record visits to detention facilities in Russia and listed one message collected from a person reportedly deprived of liberty there. Several member states participating in Monday’s meeting are expected to call for full and unimpeded access for the ICRC and other independent monitors to all POWs and civilian detainees.
Sexual violence in detention may also feature prominently at Monday’s meeting. In findings published in June, the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine (COI) said that Russian authorities had committed the war crimes of sexual violence, including rape, that often amounted to torture. In its March 2025 report, the COI said that Russian authorities had “systematically used sexual violence as a form of torture in detention facilities” and that most of the victims were men. The report also documented cases of the war crimes of rape and sexual violence, committed as a form of torture, against female detainees.
The recruitment of foreign nationals into the Russian armed forces is a new topic of discussion. According to the concept note, the COI reported that nationals of at least 17 countries had been recruited into the Russian armed forces. The Commission’s March 2026 report noted that many of these foreign nationals had been “deceived and lured from abroad through promises of civilian employment or other lucrative arrangements”.
At Monday’s meeting, Fuentes Julio is likely to address the treatment of POWs and other conflict-related detainees, including foreign fighters, and to highlight OHCHR’s lack of access to detainees held by Russia. She may also discuss foreign nationals fighting on both sides of the conflict, focusing on the legal and protection issues arising from their status under IHL. The other briefers are expected to complement OHCHR’s presentation with first-hand testimonies, including on detention in Russian custody.
Most Council members are expected to emphasise the obligation of all parties to comply fully with IHL and IHRL. Several members may welcome continuing POW exchanges and call for further arrangements to facilitate the return of POWs and unlawfully detained civilians. Reflecting the concept note’s messages, they may argue that humanitarian measures should proceed irrespective of political negotiations and that human lives must remain at the centre of any peace process.
Several members, particularly the European Council members, are likely to condemn the torture, ill-treatment, executions, and sexual abuse of Ukrainian POWs and civilian detainees documented by UN mechanisms and demand accountability for alleged violations. They may also call on Russia to provide the ICRC and other independent monitoring mechanisms with full access to all detainees and to immediately release civilians detained arbitrarily or without a lawful basis.
On the recruitment of foreign nationals, several members may condemn practices by the Russian armed forces documented by the COI. The issue also directly concerns some current Council members. For example, Somalia is among the 17 countries whose nationals the Commission investigated as having been recruited, voluntarily or through deception, to fight with the Russian armed forces.
In August 2025, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Ukrainian forces in the Kharkiv region had encountered foreign nationals fighting for Russia, including citizens of China and Pakistan. China has rejected such claims as unfounded, stressing that it instructs its nationals to stay away from areas of armed conflict and not to participate in the military operations of any party. Pakistan has also rejected Zelenskyy’s allegation, saying that it had not been formally approached by Ukraine and that no verifiable evidence had been provided to substantiate the claim.
Ukrainian authorities have also alleged that nationals of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have been recruited into the Russian military. Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of POWs identified the DRC in June among several Francophone African countries whose citizens it says have been recruited, deceived, or killed while fighting for Russia. Given that some of the claims involving Council members remain disputed and that foreign nationals may have joined the Russian armed forces under differing circumstances, the issue could be a particularly sensitive aspect of Monday’s discussion.
Russia is expected to reject the organisers’ framing and accuse Ukraine and its supporters of politicising human rights and IHL. At the January 2025 Arria-formula meeting on Ukrainian POWs and civilian detainees—which was organised by the UK, with co-sponsorship from Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, and the US—Russia accused the organisers of focusing selectively on alleged violations against Ukrainian POWs, highlighted findings from OHCHR concerning the treatment of Russian POWs in Ukrainian custody, and rejected COI findings that were discussed at the meeting. It may raise similar points on Monday.
Russia is also likely to dispute allegations of systematic torture and sexual violence against Ukrainian POWs and detainees. In its 4 June remarks on the Secretary-General’s latest annual report on CRSV, Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia (Russia) challenged the reliability of such allegations and maintained that Russian law and military codes prohibit the abuse of POWs and civilians.
Russia may reject allegations of deceptive or coercive practices in the recruitment of foreign nationals. In a 19 February statement responding to allegations concerning Kenyan recruits, the Russian Embassy in Nairobi denied that Russian authorities had engaged in illegal recruitment and said that Russian law allows foreign nationals legally present in the country to voluntarily enlist in the Russian armed forces. Russia may also accuse Ukraine of recruiting foreign nationals. Moscow has repeatedly alleged that foreign nationals are fighting alongside Ukrainian forces, most recently referring at a 29 June Council meeting to the presence of “foreign mercenaries” at Ukrainian sites targeted by Russian forces.
