Two Crimean collaborators fighting for Russia captured by Ukraine in Kursk Oblast

Ukrainian Armed Forces have captured two Crimean collaborators in Russia’s Kursk Oblast, according to a report by the Prosecutor’s Office of Sumy Oblast on 15 October, Militarnyi says.

Russia began recruiting locals in occupied Crimea well before its 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine. In the lead-up to the full-scale war, Russia initiated conscription and mobilization in occupied parts of Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts. Later, similar measures were announced in other occupied territories. Forcing residents of occupied territories to serve in an occupying power’s military is illegal under international law, specifically Article 51 of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

The suspects, aged 51 and 45, are residents of Ukraine’s Autonomous Republic of Crimea who sided with Russia following the annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula in 2014. After the outbreak of the full-scale war, they reportedly joined the 810th Separate Guards Naval Infantry Brigade of the Russian military.

Under the procedural supervision of the Sumy Regional Prosecutor’s Office, the traitors were served a notice of suspicion for committing high treason. The pre-trial investigation is being conducted by investigators of the local office of the Security Service of Ukraine.

According to the prosecutor’s office, the collaborators participated in battles in Kherson Oblast. In the summer of 2024, their units were transferred by the Russian command to Russia’s Kursk Oblast, where they were subsequently captured by the Armed Forces of Ukraine while serving as riflemen.

Militarnyi recently reported that of those captured in Russia’s Kursk Oblast, Ukraine exchanged not all Russian conscript POWs in previous prisoner swaps. At the time of the journalists’ visit, there were about fifty prisoners of war in the facility. The composition includes conscripts, junior command officers (mostly company commanders), mobilized and contract soldiers, and fighters from the Chechen Akhmat battalion.

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