A former Ukrainian prisoner of war has given a horrific account of the abuse he endured during 1,183 days in Russian captivity.Khuan Alberto Levya Garsiya said he suffered 'every imaginable form of torture', including daily beatings, electric shocks and sexual abuse.Two of his friends were beaten to death in detention centres in the Donetsk region, while other prisoners were left starving and riddled with disease, he said.'Yes … I was tortured,' Garsiya told reporters after a UN meeting.'Anything you can think of that can be done hurtful, humiliating to a man, unwillingly. Anything that comes to your mind, not only verbal, physical abuse, daily beatings, electrocution, excessive, excessive exercises in freezing cold when it's minus degrees … sexual abuse.'Everything that can be applied to a person into making a person break mentally. It was all applied to me and most of my comrades.'Garsiya told the UN meeting that prisoners were crammed into 'overcrowded barracks without adequate conditions', where 'almost all POWs were ill with dysentery'.His account came as more than 95 per cent of Ukrainian prisoners of war interviewed by the UN reported being tortured or ill-treated in Russian captivity.More than half also reported sexual violence, including 'rape, gang rape, beating while nude, beatings to the genitals, electric shocks to the genitals and nipples, and degrading treatment of a sexualized nature'. Khuan Alberto Levya Garsiya (pictured) said he suffered 'every imaginable form of torture', including daily beatings, electric shocks and sexual abuse Smoke rises in the city during a Russian missile strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine August 11, 2026 Service members of the 93rd Kholodnyi Yar Separate Mechanized Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces walk on a damaged street in the frontline town of Druzhkivka, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine August 10Garsiya was eventually freed after 1,183 days, but thousands of Ukrainian prisoners are believed to remain in captivity.Still an active member of the Ukrainian military, Garsiya said his captors had subjected him and his comrades to abuse designed to make them 'break mentally'. A Ukrainian with a Cuban father, he said guards singled him out because of his Latino name and accused him of being 'a mercenary and an American spy'.Former detainees and Ukrainian officials accused Russia at an informal UN Security Council meeting on Monday of systematically torturing prisoners of war and civilian detainees.They alleged captives were held incommunicado and subjected to beatings, electric shocks and sexual abuse.Crimean Tatar activist Leniie Umerova, who was released in a prisoner exchange in 2024, said she was detained while trying to visit her seriously ill father in Crimea.She described being moved through 'seven detention facilities' in what she called 'a carousel of repression' and accused Russia of using torture against Ukrainians in captivity.Oleg Gushin, of the Ukrainian government's Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War, said Kyiv had identified more than 300 detention sites in Russia and occupied Ukrainian territory.More than 9,000 Ukrainians have been returned through prisoner exchanges, he said, but 'thousands' remain in Russian captivity.U.N. Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights Claudia Fuentes Julio said U.N. monitoring showed that 'widespread and systematic torture and ill-treatment of Ukrainian prisoners of war and civilian detainees by the Russian Federation authorities continues,' including sexual violence.Since February 2022, the U.N. Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has documented the execution of 129 Ukrainian prisoners of war at the beginning of their captivity and the deaths of 48 in custody, resulting from torture, denial of medical care, or other inhumane conditions of detention, she said.The UN has also received 'consistent accounts' of severe beatings with batons, heavy belts and pieces of wood, as well as electric shocks, dog attacks and mock executions.Ukraine's Chargé d'Affaires Volodymyr Pavlichenko called for greater international pressure and accountability over Russia's treatment of prisoners.Russia rejected the allegations, with its Deputy UN Representative Maria Zabolotskaya calling them 'a disinformation campaign'.She instead alleged that Russian prisoners held in Ukraine had been subjected to 'torture and degradation and moral and physical abuse'.Fuentes Julio said the UN had also documented torture and ill-treatment of Russian and third-country prisoners of war held by Ukraine, but 'on a fundamentally different scale'.Around half of the Russian and third-country prisoners interviewed reported abuse during the initial stages of their captivity, she said.