Russia stages fake ‘saboteur’ trial after abducting 56-year-old Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant employee

Another fake ‘trial’ is about to be staged in occupied Zaporizhzhia oblast, with the victim – 56-year-old Natalia Shulha – the latest of many employees of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant [ZNPP] whom the Russians have abducted and illegally imprisoned.  With particular cynicism, the aggressor state, which has not only invaded and occupied almost 20% of Ukraine’s territory but is systematically bombing critical infrastructure and other civilian targets, has accused the abducted woman of attacking such infrastructure.

On 4 December 2024, almost six months after the Russian invaders abducted 56-year-old Natalia Shulha from her home in occupied Enerhodar, the occupation ‘Zaporizhzhia regional prosecutor announced that her ‘case’ had been passed to the occupation ‘Zaporizhzhia regional court’.  The Russian report called Shulha “a member of a sabotage group which tried to blow up a power line” and said that she was accused of having joined a ‘sabotage society created by Ukraine’s security service” in February 2022.  Nothing is said of the fact that such an alleged ‘saboteur’ group would have been made up of Ukrainians defending their country against an invading force.  Instead, the report jumps to June 2024 when it is alleged that Shulha, acting on instructions from her SBU ‘fixer’, had taken the shell of a homemade explosive device from a hiding place in Enerhodar.  The FSB had, purportedly, known about the device and had replaced it with an empty shell.  It is then asserted that, on 12 June 2024, Shulha attached the shell to an electricity pylon, at which point she was “detained”.  The puppet prosecutor of the country relentlessly bombing entire Ukrainian power stations pretends pathos in stating that the pylon provides electricity to 10 thousand residents of the city.

In violation of international law, Russia is charging the Ukrainian woman under Russian legislation.  She is accused of ‘involvement in a sabotage group’ (under Article 281.3 § 2 of Russia’s criminal code); of attempted sabotage (Article 281 § 2, Article 30); trying to illegally obtain, possess, transport, etc. explosive devices (Article 222.1 § 4).  All of this is claimed to have been as part of an organized group. 

There is effectively no way of ascertaining whether any part of Russia’s claims about the planned ‘attack’ was true, though or merely the latest ‘plot’ in the favourite FSB ‘thwarted terrorism’ genre. Enerhodar residents showed great courage in trying to stop the Russian invaders entering their city and the neighbouring Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in February-March 2022.  Russian repression will have forced opposition to go underground but is unlikely to have eradicated it.

It is, in fact, just as probable that Natalia Shulha,  like any other Ukrainian ‘detained’ / ‘abducted’ and later accused of such charges, is an innocent victim, seized for the FSB to claim ‘success in catching saboteurs’ and to sow terror. 

Russia began such fabricated ‘trials’ in occupied Crimea almost immediately after its invasion, and in several cases where those seized were later either allowed independent lawyers, or were released, they have given harrowing details of the torture used to extract ‘confessions’ and the methods used to fabricate ‘evidence’. 

The so-called ‘trial’ will take place at an unrecognized and illegal ‘court’ without any witnesses, and with Shulha almost certainly denied any of the components of a fair trial.

In commenting upon Russia’s planned ‘trial’ of Natalia Shulha, Enerhodar Mayor Dmytro Orlov called this Russia’s latest fabricated prosecution of residents of his city.  He is blunt in saying that Shulha, a payroll clerk at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, was abducted by the Russians on 12 June.  The supposed ‘proof’ that Shulha’s captors showed, he says, were videoed in different places and from different angles, by the Russians themselves after Shulha had been taken prisoner and forced to take part in their cynical staged stunts.

As mentioned, Natalia Shulha is by no means the first employee of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant to be abducted and then be faced with surreal charges.   Fake ‘trials’ with long sentences have already been staged against Serhiy Korzh, a 48-year-old engineer from the plant, and 62-year-old Serhiy Spartesny, who headed a turbine department at the plant. 

The charges against Natalia Shulha seem ominously similar to those against Tetiana Klochko, who was sentenced by an illegitimate ‘court’ to 12 years’ imprisonment in August 2024.