Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine have been rated the lowest-scoring place in Freedom House’s Freedom in the World 2026 assessment, receiving a global freedom score of –1 out of 100. The score applies to “Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine” as a unified related-territory entry, not to sovereign, government-controlled Ukraine, which Freedom House rates at 51/100 and classifies as Partly Free. Freedom House says it began assessing Crimea, eastern Donbas and other Russian-occupied areas together in the 2025 edition because conditions across the occupied territories had become similar.
The watchdog says Russian occupation authorities have eliminated genuine political competition, suppressed independent media and applied repressive Russian law in territories seized and annexed in violation of international law. The rating also reflects coercive passportization. A 2023 Russian presidential decree treated Ukrainians in occupied areas who refused Russian citizenship as foreign citizens, while a March 2025 decree required Ukrainians without legal status to regularize it or leave by September 10, 2025.
Human Rights Watch said this amounted to an ultimatum to obtain Russian passports or risk expulsion. UN human rights monitors have separately documented arbitrary detention, enforced disappearance, torture, ill-treatment and unlawful killings of civilians in Russian-occupied areas. Together, the findings describe an occupation sustained by forced loyalty, systemic repression and the erasure of Ukrainian civic life, alongside continued military control.
