Eighteen prisoners of war from Aidar Battalion to be tried in Russia

A so-called "trial" of eighteen Aidar Battalion soldiers will take place in Rostov, Russia. 

It is a report of Russian propaganda media.

On October 18, 2022, the prosecutor's office of the so-called 'Donetsk People's Republic' reported that it had submitted the case against 18 members of the Aidar unit to court.

The prisoners of war were accused of participating in and organising terrorist activities.

Kavkaz. Realii has already reported on the first open hearing regarding the soldiers, which was to take place on July 7, 2023, but was postponed to July 25.

The lawyer of one of the soldiers, Pavel Kosovan, confirmed that the soldiers were accused of allegedly participating in the activities of a terrorist organisation and the violent seizure of power and change of the constitutional order in the temporarily occupied Donetsk region.

According to an excerpt from the Southern Federal District Military Court of the Russian Federation documents, which is available to Svidomi, until July 10, 2023, the soldiers were held in a detention centre in the so-called 'Donetsk People's Republic'. Then they were transferred to a detention centre in the Rostov region.

Halyna Haiokha, the sister of one of the fighters, says that she last contacted her brother on June 7. He then informed her that he was in captivity in the temporarily occupied Donetsk. After that, she could not get in touch with her brother.

"I learnt about the so-called 'court' from a message from a Russian journalist. He wrote that he wanted to interview my brother and was looking for the relatives of the 'defendants'," Halyna told Svidomi.

Ihor Haiokha is a fighter with the 24th Separate Assault Battalion "Aidar", originally from the Luhansk region. He has been in service since 2014. When the full-scale invasion began, Haiokha was stationed near Volnovakha. In March 2022, his family was informed of his death, but in April of the same year, footage of him in captivity was released.

Another soldier, Vitalii Hruzynov, was captured on March 11, 2022, near Volnovakha. Footage of his interrogation was posted online. He was a civic activist. He participated in the Language and Tax Maidans. He was repeatedly detained. 

Mykola Chupryna was taken prisoner no later than March 2, 2022. Taras Radchenko and Serhii Mykytiuk — no later than March 30 of the same year. Footage of Serhii Nedostup's interrogation was released on April 8, and the video with Evhenii Piatyhorets' was released on April 13, 2022.

Other defendants include Andrii Sholik, Viacheslav Baidiuk, Maryna Mishchenko, Liliia Prutian, Vitalii Krokhalev, Dmytro Fedchenko, Semen Zabairachnyi, Serhii Mykytiuk, Vladyslav Yermolynskyi, Serhii Kalinichenko.

Svidomi appealed to the Ukrainian Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights, the Minister for Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories of Ukraine and the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine to comment on what the Ukrainian side knows about the trial of the military. We have not yet received a response.