Russia’s Southern District Military Court in Rostov has passed a 20-year sentence against Maksym Timofieiev on identical charges to those used to sentence another Ukrainian from occupied Melitopol, Maksym Vorobiov, to 16 years in October 2024. Both men were illegally tried under Russia’s flawed terrorism legislation, although the impugned actions would have, at most, constituted acts of resistance against the Russian invaders. There are also legitimate grounds for doubting the charges and any ‘confessions’ which Russia’s FSB are known to extract through torture.
Russia uses such illegal ‘arrests’ on occupied territory and such trials and horrific sentences as methods of intimidation and the propaganda uses of two separate lots of reports may be the reason why the two men were tried separately.
Both Maksym Timofieiev and 33-year-old Maksym Vorobiov were seized in August 2023 and have clearly been imprisoned ever since. It was claimed that, in 2023, Vorobiov had become a member of a ‘terrorist organization’ and had, on 2 April that year, proposed that Timofieiev also become a member. Timofeiev allegedly agreed, “expressing willingness to plan and carry out terrorist acts by blowing up locomotive engines at a Melitopol depot.”
The two men had, supposedly, leaped into action, taking homemade explosive devices from a secret hiding place on 5 April 2023 and attached one of these devices to a petrol tank of a locomotive, setting a timer in motion. The court report states that this was guarded territory, yet the two are alleged to have succeeded in carrying out that explosion and two others, on 21 April 2023 and on 12 June 2023, without being caught. Timofieiev is said to have been seized on 22 August 2023.
He was charged with ‘involvement in a terrorist organization’, under Article 205.4 § 2 of Russia’s criminal code; with illegally obtaining, possessing and carrying explosive devices and substances (Article 222.1 § 4) and with three ‘terrorist acts’, committed by a group through prior conspiracy and causing significant damage (under Article 205 § 2a and c).
There were a reasonable number of court hearings which may mean that Timofieiev denied the charges. All of these ‘trials’ of Ukrainians at the Southern District Military Court end in convictions, with the only variable being the size of the sentence. On 27 January 2025, ‘judge’ Valery Sergeevich Opanasenko from the Southern District Military Court in Rostov to 20 years’ harsh-regime (maximum-security) imprisonment, with the first three years to be in a prison (the harshest of Russian penal institutions), with the remainder in a prison colony. A massive 600 thousand rouble fine was also imposed. Timofieiev is probably held prisoner in a SIZO [remand prison] in Rostov oblast where he will remain, if he lodges an appeal against the sentence, until the appeal is heard.
Makysm Vorobiov was sentenced on 22 October 2024 to 16 years’ harsh-regime imprisonment, also with the first three years in a prison. ‘Judge’ Pavel Yurievich Gubarev from the same Southern District Military Court also imposed a fine of 500 thousand roubles.
The charges were the same as those against Timofieiev, except that Vorobiov was also accused of ‘abetting terrorist activities’, under Article 205.1 § 1.1. It was reported at the time, that he had told the court that he had a 9-year-old child, whose childhood he did not wish to miss; that he had admitted the charges and cooperated with the prosecution. This may possibly have been the reason why his sentence was shorter than Timofieiev’s, however a 16-year sentence is still horrific.
Russia’s use of railways, including from Russia and Belarus, for its war of aggression against Ukraine has led to a revival of the partisan resistance seen during the Second World War against the Nazi invaders. It is quite likely that the depot in question is being used by the invaders for war purposes. Whether or not the two men were, in fact, involved in this, Russia is an invading power who is illegally applying its legislation on illegally occupied territory, including preposterous ‘terrorism’ charges.
