The Eastern Human Rights Group (EHRG) stated that 5,000 people in Luhansk People's Republic had been held in solitary confinement, beaten, starved or tortured for refusing to carry out unpaid work. EHRG claimed to have evidence that the situation was similar in Donetsk People's Republic. According to the EHRG "All this takes place for the purpose of enriching a certain group of people in the so-called LPR." Inmates conditions had deteriorated in separatist controlled detention centres and relatives paid LPR authorities to ensure the safety of inmates.'Slave labour' in the prisons of eastern Ukraine, BBC News (3 October 2016)
