Donetsk, Jul 31 - DAN. Co-ordinator of the Humanitarian Working Group Toni Frisch has confirmed that he is ready to check the conditions at Mariupol and Artyomovsk prisons where female DPR supporters are kept amidst reports that they are tortured.

“OSCE representatives’ visit to penitentiaries where Ukraine keeps those detainees has been discussed,” DPR ombudswoman Darya Morozova said after a video conference on Monday. “I asked the humanitarian group coordinator to visit the women who are subject to daily torture at Ukrainian prisons. Mr Frisch confirmed his readiness to come and inspect the detainees’ conditions at Mariupol and Artyomovsk prisons.”

According to the ombudswoman, the video conference participants focused on the discussion of the list of detainees confirmed by both sides. She reminded Kiev that they had not given official answers to 61 requests to confirm the presence of DPR supporters in Ukrainian territory.

“Meanwhile, Ukraine continues to openly manipulate the detainee lists, summing up DPR and LPR prisoners and decreasing the overall figure. Kiev officials deliberately evade the preliminary accord on ‘all-for-all’ exchange of confirmed detainees,” she said.

Morozova added that in the course of talks Kiev had again failed to confirm the readiness to exchange the verified persons. DPR forwarded to the humanitarian group coordinator the list of persons on whom it had been seeking information from Ukraine.

Earlier on Monday, the Minsk humanitarian group participants discussed prisoner exchange issues via a video link.*jk