Ukraine woman who was gang raped and set on fire, dies

Oksana Makar was attacked by three men in the Mykolaiv region of Ukraine. Photograph: AP

An 18-year-old Ukrainian woman has died in hospital after being gang-raped, half-strangled and set on fire. The attack on Oksana Makar led to hundreds of protesters taking to the streets in the town of Mykolayiv in the south of the country after police released two of her three suspected attackers whose parents had political connections, reigniting a debate on corruption in the former Soviet republic.

The two men were rearrested and police disciplined after the intervention of President Viktor Yanukovych. The three young men have been charged with rape and one with attempted murder. An 18-year-old Ukrainian woman who prosecutors say was gang-raped, half-strangled and then set on fire in an attack that sparked street protests in a provincial Ukrainian town, has died, a hospital official said on Thursday.

Hundreds of people took to the streets earlier this month after police released two of Oksana Makar's three suspected attackers whose parents had political connections, reigniting a public debate on corruption in the ex-Soviet republic.

The two men were rearrested and police disciplined after the intervention of President Viktor Yanukovich who sent an investigating team to the town of Mykolayiv in southern Ukraine.

All three young men have been charged with rape and one of them additionally with attempted murder.

Ukrainian media regularly report cases of children of the country's wealthy elite, who are known as "mazhory", escaping punishment from traffic offences, or from more serious crimes including causing fatal road accidents while at the wheel.

The interior minister, Vitaly Zakharchenko, confirmed earlier this month that the parents of at least one of the three suspects were former government officials in the Mykolaiv region.

"Lung bleeding began and then her heart activity stopped," said Emil Fistal, head of the specialist burns unit where Makar was taken for treatment.

Local media claimed that Makar met two of the three accused in a local bar on 10 March and after spending some time there with them, went to the apartment of the third.

The reports allege she was then raped and that one of the suspected attackers tried to strangle her with a cord. They allegedly wrapped her in a blanket, took her to a pit on a building site and tried to set her body on fire before escaping.

She was found by a passing motorist and taken to hospital with serious burns. She had both feet and an arm amputated in surgery, according to the reports.