Ukraine passed first verdict for war crime committed in occupied Crimea

Ukraine's court passed the first sentence for a war crime committed in the temporarily occupied Crimea. Two former SSU employees who tortured Euromaidan activist Oleksandr Kostenko were convicted.

This was reported by the Prosecutor's Office of ARC and the city of Sevastopol on Telegram.

"This is the first sentence for violating the laws and customs of war (Article 438 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine) since the beginning of the international armed conflict in Crimea. Prosecutors proved in court that the convicts imprisoned and tortured the Ukrainian Euromaidan activist Oleksandr Kostenko," informed the head of the Crimean Prosecutor's Office, Ihor Ponochovnyi.

As noted, two former employees of the SSU of Crimea were sentenced in absentia to 9 and 10 years of imprisonment.

The prosecutor's office reported that after the occupation of Crimea, they began to cooperate with the enemy and transferred to the service of the so-called FSB of the russian federation in the Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol.

"At the beginning of 2015, FSB agents in Simferopol kidnapped and later imprisoned Oleksandr Kostenko, a Ukrainian activist, the Revolution of Dignity participant. He was subjected to electric torture, physical violence, and threats. With these methods, the convicts tried to get a confession to the crime, which the activist did not commit, namely in causing bodily harm to an employee of the "Berkut" special unit in 2014 on Maidan Nezalezhnosti in Kyiv," the prosecutor's office said.

A few months later, the occupiers had already started the "trial" of the victim. The charges against him were presented by the former occupation "prosecutor" of Crimea, Nataliya Poklonska. Later, for this case, she received the title of "general."

Reference

On February 5, 2015, two employees of the FSB of the russian federation kidnapped Oleksandr Kostenko near his house in Simferopol.

He was tortured, accusing that on February 18, 2014, in Kyiv, Kostenko allegedly injured an employee of the Crimean special unit "Berkut."

The political prisoner did not admit his guilt. The occupation "court" sentenced him to 3.5 years of imprisonment. The Crimean was kept in the russian correctional colony in the city of Kirovo-Chepetsk.

After the expiration of the term and release since August 2018, Kostenko lived in Kyiv.