Security Service detains pro-Russia ‘separatist’ scouts, mercenaries, recruiter

The counter-intelligence unit of the Security Service of Ukraine has detained a former officer of the Druzhkivka district police directorate in Donetsk Oblast, who joined the gang of the criminal known as Desant, the UNIAN news agency reported on 15 October.

The Security Service of Ukraine learned that the 25-year-old former police officer supplied food, collected and transferred information about the strength and locations of Ukrainian government troops.

The Security Service of Ukraine also detained two scouts from the Druzhok armed gang headed by the criminal known as Sokil. The scouts, known under the nicknames Lyonya and Ruslan, fought against the government troops, collected and transferred information on their whereabouts to separatists.

In Kherson Oblast, the Security Service of Ukraine detained a 42-year-old man, engaged in spying against Ukraine and recruitment of mercenaries, when he was attempting to cross from Crimea into mainland Ukraine, UNIAN said in a different report on 15 October.

It was established that the man recruited inmates of Zhdanivka penal colony No 3 in Donetsk Region and arranged for their two-week training in subversive activities at a camp in Russia’s Rostov Oblast. The Security Service of Ukraine added that after completing the training, the mercenaries were sent back to Donetsk and Luhansk regions to fight against the security operation troops.

The man used to collect information on the strength and types of Ukrainian government troops and arms and send it to the Russian national “A”, also known as Nos, who is a cadre of the Russian General Staff’s Main Intelligence Directorate and the chief of police in the so-called Donetsk people’s republic.

The Security Service of Ukraine also detained a Russian national who fought with the terrorists of the so-called Donetsk people’s republic against the Ukrainian government troops for three months, UNIAN said on 14 October.

The criminal said he had been trained in a camp for mercenaries in Russia’s Rostov-na-Donu and given the nickname Matros. Along with three other mercenaries, he crossed into Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast through a Russian checkpoint. He was given a people’s militia ID describing him as a MANPAD operator and armed with an assault rifle.
He told the Security Service of Ukraine that during his watch at the militants’ roadblocks close to the border, at least 200 Russian military vehicles had crossed into Ukraine from Russia’s Rostov Oblast through the Izvaryne checkpoint.

A Luhansk resident involved with separatist gangs has received a suspended sentence in Sumy Oblast, the local Security Service of Ukraine directorate told UNIAN on 15 October.

In May-July, he was a member of the Prizrak and Vostok-13 gangs of the so-called Luhansk people’s republics, which abducted local residents. He also supplied information about the security operation troops to separatists.

An operative group of the State Guard Directorate has detained a 25-year-old Kharkiv resident when he and his accomplice were trying to knock out a bank window using the explosives and petrol bombs, UNIAN said on 15 October. The detained man was wearing a Russian army uniform and a face mask, it added.

This was the fourth attack on the Kharkiv offices of Privatbank, which is tied to Ukrainian tycoon and Dnipropetrovsk regional governor Ihor Kolomoysky.