Chairman of the Investigative Committee (IC) of Russia Alexander Bastrykin instructed to open a criminal case against the employees of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), who initiated a criminal case against the head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov.
“It is obvious that the decisions of the SBU on the criminal prosecution of these officials who are citizens of the Russian Federation were taken on far-fetched grounds and contradict the law,” the press release of the Investigative Committee says.
The “officials” that the Investigative Committee writes about are Daniil Martynov, Deputy Chief of the Russian Guard Troops in the Chechen Republic, and Hussein Mezhidov, commander of the tactical group of the 249th separate motorized battalion “South” of the Russian Guard. The SBU accuses them of violating the laws and customs of war, cruel treatment of prisoners of war and the civilian population. Kadyrov is accused of preparing and unleashing an aggressive war, taking actions to change the borders of Ukraine, as well as justifying Russia's military aggression against Ukraine.
On August 26, the SBU announced that it had collected "undoubtable evidence of [their] war crimes." She claims that in February-March 2022, Kadyrov personally supervised the development and planning of individual military operations of the Chechen divisions of the National Guard, gave orders, heard reports and reports from their leaders.
Martynov, according to the SBU, on March 5 personally led the seizure of a psycho-neurological boarding school (PNI) in Borodyanka, Kyiv region. Then almost 500 patients and employees of the medical facility were taken hostage. Mezhidov has been charged with commanding the capture and holding hostage of almost 200 civilians in Gostomel.
Kadyrov recorded an audio message in response to the accusations of the SBU. It was published in his Telegram channel: “Gentlemen of the security forces, determine the place where we will appear. We will be happy to come and find out who is the criminal, who is the murderer, who is the terrorist.”
