This emerges from a classified report by the German Federal Intelligence Service (BND), as reported by “Spiegel”. According to the seven-page document, the Russian Imperial League (RIL) and the Rusich group are “at least two right-wing extremist groups” fighting the Ukrainian army.
Furthermore, Moscow is using at least one “right-wing extremist individual for its own purposes,” according to the classified document. Cooperation with these groups “reduces ad absurdum the supposed motive for the war, the so-called ‘denazification’ of Ukraine”, the analysts write.
unknown number
The document gives no information on the number of right-wing extremist fighters. However, groupings and units are named. Thus, the “Imperial Russian Legion”, the paramilitary arm of the extremist right-wing group “Imperial Russian Movements”, has already intervened in the fighting.
After the group had already fought on the Russian side in Ukraine’s Donbass in 2014 and 2015, RIL chief Denis Garieyev wrote on Telegram just a day after the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022: “There is no doubt what we are talking about for the liquidation of the separatist entity Ukraine.”
As the BND further reports, Gariyev’s deputy died in fighting in Ukraine. Gariyev himself was taken away wounded, and at least two other right-wing extremists were seriously injured.
The “Rusich” group would also be involved in the fighting. In many places it is attributed to the notorious Russian mercenary group “Wagner” and was also deployed to Donbass in 2014 and 2015. It is said that “Rusich” became part of combat operations on Ukrainian territory until the beginning of April, the latest delay