The leader of a Russian-controlled military unit in Ukraine faces the death penalty, activist group Gulagu reports. The troop of the 43-year-old convict is said to have previously withdrawn from the front.
According to the human rights organization Gulagu, Russian military want to execute a convict because the unit he commanded in Ukraine is said to have withdrawn from the front line. According to this, the wife of the man named Viktor Sevalnev called the activists on Sunday and reported that her husband should appear before a firing squad. He told her over the phone that he had already been picked up from the hospital where he was being treated for his battle injuries.
According to Gulagu, Sevalnev was serving a four-year prison sentence for assault in penal colony No. 3 in the Kaluga region. In order to escape abuse and harassment in prison, the 43-year-old volunteered for the war in Ukraine. At the beginning of October he was transported with other prisoners to the Donbass, where he was assigned to the 7th Motorized Rifle Brigade of the self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic (military unit no. 08807).
Sevalnew reportedly fought in a company and took over the unit after the commander was killed in action. The troops are said to have suffered heavy casualties. According to the Gulagu, Sevalnev was wounded several times, but returned to service. According to the activists, in revenge because his son, who also served in the unit, was killed.
Sevalnew is not a sympathetic character, Gulagu writes on Telegram. He took part in the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine as a mercenary and killed people. However, the execution was wrong. “We personally call on the prosecutors and military investigators, as well as General Sergei Surovikin, to take comprehensive measures to lift the punitive order to execute Sevalnev,” the appeal reads. According to the information, Sevalnev regrets going to war and would like to return to the penal colony.