Tortured to death by Russian invaders, sentenced to 10 years or abducted, whereabouts unknown
Russia’s notorious Southern District Military Court in Rostov has sentenced 23-year-old Rustam Chyzhyk to ten year’s imprisonment on dubious ‘terrorism’ charges. Almost nothing is known about the specific indictment, nor about the trial, however Chyzhyk was one of at least five young Ukrainians abducted from Russian-occupied Hornostaiivka (Kherson oblast) in November 2023, with the Russians seemingly grabbing them in connection with a drone attack on the occupation ‘police’ building on 13 November 2023. 28-year-old Ruslan Rusnak was tortured to death, and the whereabouts of the other three: Anton Shtepa, his twin brother Ivan Shtepa, and Denys Shum are unknown.
Aged just 22, Rustam Chyzhyk was abducted from his home in Hornostaiivka in the morning of 13 November 2023. His family told the Centre for Journalist Investigations that Rustam had been planning to leave occupied territory, but was trapped after the Russians had earlier detained him and taken his passport away. On that occasion, they had released him, but demanded that he take Russian citizenship, which he refused to do. When the Russians returned on 13 November, they accused Rustam of storing weapons (judging by the indictment, a grenade and two TNT blocks). His relatives are adamant that this was not true and that the Russians may have planted the devices which they then claimed to have ‘found’ during their so-called search.
By late February 2024, it was known that he had been held for a while at the Russian military command, and had then, reportedly, been taken to the Krasnodar krai in Russia.
In late June 2024, an indictment against Chyzhyk was passed to the Southern District Military Court. As well as the alleged possession of explosives, which Rustam’s family rejects, the prosecution had added a ‘terrorism’ charge, with this significantly increasing the essentially predetermined sentence. The young Ukrainian was charged with ‘planning terrorist acts’ under Articles 205 § 1 and 30 § 1 of Russia’s criminal code; two possession of explosives charges under Article 222; and, judging by the court’s entry, a rather bizarre charge, under Article 134 § 1 of having sex with a minor.
In reporting the sentence on 2 February, the Russian state-controlled RIA Novosti claimed that Chyzhyk had planned to commit ‘an act of terrorism’ with the use of a grenade and two TNT blocks, but that he had been ‘thwarted’ by the FSB. It can surely be disputed whether any planned attack, should such have existed, on soldiers of an invading army should be called ‘a terrorist act’. In fact, however, there is no proof that there ever was such a plan, with it a standard part of FSB practice to fabricate such alleged ‘thwarted terrorist attacks’, with the only ‘evidence’ of such typically coming from ‘confessions’ obtained through torture and planted grenades, etc.
Frighteningly little is known about this ‘trial’, including whether Chyzhyk had an independent lawyer. There were six hearings before ‘judge’ Denis Vitalievich Vovchenko retired to prepare his verdict, with this probably meaning that Chyzhyk denied some or all of the charges.
Rustam was sentenced to ten years, with the first two years in a prison, the worst of Russia’s penal institutions, with the rest in a harsh-regime (maximum-security) prison colony. He was also ordered to pay a fine of 30 thousand roubles.
28-year-old Ruslan Rusnak died on 20 November 2023, just hours after he was seized by the Russians in occupied Hornostaiivka and taken to the occupation police station. The invaders supposedly claimed that Rusnak had provided Ukraine’s Armed Forces with the ‘police station’s’ coordinates, information which could almost certainly be obtained from Google. Ruslan had earlier defended Ukraine in Donbas, with this enough for the Russians to target him. the Internet.
Reports of Ruslan’s death appeared almost immediately in Russian sources, however it was only on 28 November 2023, that Ruslan’s family were officially informed of his death, with the Russians claiming that he had died “of an ulcer”.
Denys Shum; Anton and Ivan Shtepa
Three other residents of Chornobaiivka – 23-year-old Denys Shum and 22-year-old twins Anton and Ivan Shtepa – were also seized by the Russians on 20 November 2023. The last three and others were known to have been held and, doubtless, tortured at the House of Culture in occupied Odradivka, which the Russian invaders used as a torture prison. Their whereabouts remain unknown.
The Russians, reportedly, seized seven civilians on 20 November, purportedly over the drone attack on 13 November. Two young lads were released after several days; Ruslan Rusnak was tortured to death and three (or, seemingly, four) others disappeared without trace. If the drone attack occurred early on 13 November, then this may have been the pretext for Rustam Chyzhyk’s abduction also. If, however, that was the case, the FSB later fabricated quite different charges against the young man, charges which the ever-obliging ‘court’ in Rostov turned into a ten-year sentence.