Russia Illegally Detained an OSCE Employee: Ministry of Foreign Affairs Reveals New Details

Russia illegally imprisoned OSCE employee Vadym Golda and transferred him to a correctional facility in Tambov region. This relocation creates a serious threat to the detainee's physical and mental health.

New details were reported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine.

What is known about the OSCE employee's imprisonment?

According to the MFA, if officially confirmed, Vadym Golda will become the third monitor from the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Temporarily Occupied Territories to be forcibly moved to Russia.

Head of the ministry Andriy Sibiga emphasized that Moscow's blatant disregard for international law has no limits.

The minister noted that the deportation of detainees contravenes the basic obligations of the aggressor state under the Geneva Conventions.

Such actions may also be classified as war crimes and will become another episode in a string of grave violations experienced by three OSCE staff members,

— stressed Andriy Sibiga.

Call for international response

Ukrainian diplomats plan to raise the issue of transporting the mission worker at the OSCE Permanent Council meeting. Official Kyiv demands immediate intervention by the leadership to protect the detained's rights.

"I call on the OSCE Secretary-General and the Swiss chairmanship to urgently take measures to establish the location of the staff members and ensure their immediate and unconditional release. Ukraine will also raise this issue at the OSCE Permanent Council meeting," said the foreign minister.

He added that all three OSCE Special Monitoring Mission staff — Dmytro Shabanov, Maksym Petrov, and Vadym Golda — must finally be released immediately.

Fabricated verdicts against monitors

As a reminder, we previously reported that Russia held Vadym Golda in total isolation without contact and planned to transfer him to Siberia. In August 2024, a Kremlin-controlled court in Donetsk sentenced the man to 14 years in prison on fabricated charges of espionage.

Other mission staff, Dmytro Shabanov and Maksym Petrov, were sentenced by the occupation court in September 2022 to 13 years in prison for alleged treason.