Ukraine's Security Service and prosecutors identify two Russian torturers who ordered to behead Ukrainian POW – photo
The Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) and Donetsk Oblast Prosecutor’s Office have identified and collected evidence against two more Russian war criminals involved in the killing of Ukrainian prisoners of war in Donetsk Oblast.
Source: Donetsk Oblast Prosecutor’s Office; Security Service of Ukraine
Quote from the prosecutor’s office: "'Leave no one alive', 'behead' fallen Ukrainian heroes and 'mount the severed heads on stakes and display them like fences where Ukrainian flags used to be' – these were the orders given by commanders of Russian units who go by the alias Yustas and Sber in 2024 during the assault on the village of Staromaiorske. Additionally, representatives of the so-called 'second army of the world' instructed their troops to loot the fallen, take their money and gold, and rip off their combat identification patches."
Details: The SSU reports that the suspects are:
- Shota Karapetyan (Yustas), Deputy Commander of the 1st Motorised Rifle Battalion of the 394th Motorised Rifle Regiment, 127th Motorised Rifle Division, 5th Combined Arms Army of the Russian Federation;
- Dmitry Chikhabakh (Sber), Commander of an assault company of the Storm unit, 394th Motorised Rifle Regiment of the same Russian formation.
The investigators reported that on 17 June 2024, they ordered their subordinates to execute a captured Ukrainian soldier, behead him and place the head on the bonnet of a destroyed armoured vehicle.
The investigators reported that on 17 June 2024, they ordered their subordinates to execute a captured Ukrainian soldier, behead him and place the head on the bonnet of a destroyed armoured vehicle.
Based on materials from the military counterintelligence and investigators of the SSU, Karapetyan and Chikhabakh have been served with a notice of suspicion in absentia under Article 438.1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (violation of laws and customs of war).
Comprehensive efforts are underway to locate and bring the Russian war criminals to justice.
Quote from Donetsk Oblast Prosecutor Pavlo Uhrovetskyi: "The documentation of the brutal acts committed by war criminals on Ukrainian soil continues. These actions constitute a flagrant violation of the Geneva Conventions, the Protocol Additional on the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts, and the Hague Convention (IV) on the Laws and Customs of War on Land. The world must see who our enemy is and what cruelty they are capable of."
Background:
- In June 2024, the Office of the Prosecutor General reported that Russian forces had beheaded a serviceman of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in Donetsk Oblast. Ukrainian prosecutors had launched an investigation.
- While carrying out aerial reconnaissance at a combat position in Donetsk Oblast, Ukrainian forces spotted a damaged armoured vehicle belonging to the Ukrainian defence forces. The severed head of a Ukrainian defender was lying on top of it.
- Ukrainska Pravda obtained an audio recording of an intercepted conversation in which a Russian commander orders his subordinates to behead a Ukrainian serviceman in Donetsk Oblast.
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