Today, russian officials informed of Maxim Butkevich, an officer with ukraineArmed Forces of the U.S., confessed to intentionally targeting and injuring civilians, and was sentenced to 13 years’ imprisonment.
The ruling was made by the so-called Supreme Court of the Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR), a region of Ukraine currently occupied by Russia. Batkevich was caught By Russian forces in eastern Ukraine in June 2022.
Russian military investigators fabricated a case against Butkevich. Russian authorities published Video In fatigue talking about him with a clear investigator. In the video, Butkevich’s face is swollen and the flesh around his eyes is black and swollen. He stares into space as he mechanically recounts how he fired a grenade launcher at the civilians.
Maxim Butkevych, Max to us, is a dear friend and colleague. a prime right protector and journalist, in March 2022 he wrote that he “caught [his] Human rights and humanitarian work ”and joined the army. “All my conscious life I have been an anti-militarist and have remained so by conviction. But at this moment I feel [this is] My place These are sad times,” he wrote.
Max was Ukraine’s leading advocate for refugees and migrants. He stood up for the most marginalised, promoted tolerance and condemned hate speech. The idea of Max intentionally targeting civilians is ridiculous.
Upon learning of Max’s capture, people close to him deleted his social media accounts so that none of them could be used against him. The Kremlin-controlled media immediately described him as “”notorious Kyiv propagandist“And a”valuable catch, Today’s sentence is intended to make the “catch” even more “valuable” in order to raise the stakes in future prisoner exchanges.
For the first two months in captivity, Max’s whereabouts were unknown. Russia’s Ministry of Defense in response to inquiries from Russian lawyers working for his family where did it go That he was in a prison facility in the so-called LNR.
there is Abundant Proof Authorities in the Russian-controlled areas of Luhansk and Donetsk regions torture prisoners and denying them all due process rights. Max’s “confession” was undoubtedly obtained by force, possibly through torture. Torture or punishment of a prisoner of war without a fair trial is a gross violation of the Geneva Conventions. This makes the “trial” against him not only a slanderous one, but also a potential war crime.