Russian proxy who attempted to recruit Ukrainian officer in Odesa sentenced to 15 years in prison – photo

Ukraine has convicted a participant in the 2 May 2014 anti-Maidan riots in Odesa whom later the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) recruited under the alias Skif and who attempted to involve a Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) officer in a chain of informants in Odesa Oblast [Anti-Maidan was a number of pro-Russian demonstrations in Ukraine in 2013 and 2014 that were directed against the 2014 Revolution of Dignity and later the new Ukrainian government – ed.].

Source: SSU; Odesa Oblast Prosecutor's Office; sources of Ukrainska Pravda

Details: The SSU reported in October that Skif had been exposed. Based on the SSU's evidence base, he has now been given a real prison sentence. The court sentenced him to 15 years in prison with confiscation of property.

The convict is a Ukrainian citizen who moved to Moldova in the early 1990s, where he took part in hostilities on the side of the so-called "TMR" (Russian-backed breakaway "Transnistrian Moldovan Republic").

Later, this man fought in Dagestan and Chechnya as part of the Russian special forces unit Edelweiss.

The traitor arrived in Odesa in 2014 to stage mass riots in favour of Russia, which led to him being put on the wanted list by Ukrainian law enforcement.

He fled to unrecognised Transnistria to avoid justice, where two representatives of the local FSB branch recruited him in 2019 to carry out the tasks set by the Russian secret service.

The man attempted to recruit local representatives of law enforcement agencies to join the Russian group in Ukraine. As planned by the Russian FSB, they were supposed to pass intelligence on the deployment and movement of the Ukrainian Defence Forces in the south of Ukraine to the Russian secret service.

The prosecutor's office believes Russia's "zone of special attention" included information on individuals involved in the SSU and Ukrainian law enforcement agencies, including those operating in the so-called "TMR".

The proxy passed the intelligence to his handler, a major of the sham "Ministry of State Security of the TMR", who acted in the interests of the Russian Federation.

The SSU counterintelligence developed an operational scheme in early October 2023 and managed to get Skif out of the territory of unrecognised Transnistria.

Following the scenario of the Ukrainian special service, a Russian asset arrived in Odesa Oblast to personally recruit an SSU officer.

SSU counterintelligence officers recorded every episode of the offender's criminal activity and detained him in the oblast. The Russian proxy was detained after receiving fake information from the supposedly recruited SSU officer.

Based on the evidence collected, the court found Russian proxy Skif guilty under Article 111.2 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (high treason committed under martial law).

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