Tuesday, 11 July ‘23

Suspicion Issued to Three Russian Officials for Deporting Children 

Investigators of the Main Investigative Department of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) issued a suspicion in absentia against three officials of the Russian occupation authorities in Kherson for the deportation of 48 children from the Kherson Children's Home to the Russian Federation. 

Igor Kastyukevich, a lawmaker of Russia’s State Duma, Vadim Ilmiyev, the head of the occupation Kherson Department of Health and Tetyana Zavalska, acting head doctor of the Kherson Regional Children's Home - an institution created by the occupying authorities - are accused of violating the laws and customs of war based on a prior conspiracy by a group of persons (Part 2 of Article 28, Part 1 of Article 438 of the criminal code).

According to the investigation, in September 2022 Ilmiyev and Zavalska initially organised, and Kastyukevich managed, the deportation of two children to Russia on the justification of a medical exam in a Moscow hospital, although the children did not seem to need treatment. On October 21, 2022, the staff of the newly created "children's home" handed over 46 more children to unidentified persons. The children were taken to the territory of occupied Crimea. Their fate is currently unknown. 

According to the general prosecutor’s office of the over 92,000 war crimes recorded since Russia invaded Ukraine, about 20,000 involve the forced deportation and relocation of Ukrainian children.

SBU Announces Suspicion Against Russian Propagandist

SBU investigators reported in absentia Russian propagandist Sergey Klyuchenkov, alias Serhiy Mardan, a blogger of the pro-Kremlin publication Komsomolskaya Pravda.  

Mardan is accused of publicly calling for genocide (Part 2 of Article 442 of the criminal code), publicly calling for violent change or overthrow of the constitutional system or for the seizure of state power (Part 2 of Article 109) and for the justification, recognition as legitimate, denial of the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, which began in 2014 (Part 3 of Article 436-2).

According to the SBU, in various television broadcasts he proposed to create concentration camps for residents of temporarily occupied Ukraine who resist Russia’s authority. Forensic-linguistic examination confirmed that his actions posed a threat to Ukraine's national security. 

Captain of Russian Civilian Ship Notified of Suspicion for Transporting Weapons

SBU investigators reported in absentia a suspicion to Aleksey Tereshchenko, captain of the Russian civilian marine cargo ship Sparta-IV, for aiding Russia’s political leadership and the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in waging an aggressive war (Part 5 of Article 27 and Part 2 of Article 437 of the criminal code).

According to the investigation, in February 2023 while he was in a Syrian seaport, the suspect gave the order to load weapons, weapons and military rolling equipment onto the ship. These included two Russian Panzer-S1 missile-gun complexes, 11 Ural cars -4320 with trailers and 200 unguided rockets for salvo fire systems.

Under his leadership, false information was entered in the cargo and customs declarations, and the equipment was transported using means of masking and turning off the navigation systems. On March 7, 2023, the ship entered the Russian port of Novorossiysk, on the Black Sea, where the cargo was unloaded and transported to be used for war actions in Ukraine