- Death sentence passed in Donetsk court
- Great Britain criticizes “bogus judgement”
- UK says men are entitled to combatant immunity
LONDON (Reuters) – Two Britons and a Moroccan captured fighting for Ukraine were sentenced to death on Thursday by a court in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), one of Russia’s proxies in eastern Ukraine, news outlets reported .
The court found the three men – Britons Aiden Aslin and Shaun Pinner and Moroccan Brahim Saadoun – guilty of “mercenary activity and committing acts aimed at seizing power and overthrowing the constitutional order of the DPR,” the newspaper quoted as saying Interfax news agency a court official.
The three men were captured while fighting for Ukraine against Russia and Russian-backed troops after Russia invaded on February 24. Their attorney said they would appeal the decision.
Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com
to register
Great Britain criticized the court’s decision as a “sham judgement”.
“I strongly condemn the condemnation of Aiden Aslin and Shaun Pinner by Russian proxies in eastern Ukraine,” Secretary of State Liz Truss said on Twitter. “They are prisoners of war. That is a bogus judgment without any legitimacy.”
Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s spokesman said that under the Geneva Conventions, prisoners of war are entitled to combatant immunity and should not be prosecuted for taking part in hostilities.
Robert Jenrick, the MP for the district where Aslin’s family lives, said the trial was similar to a “Soviet-era show trial” and urged Truss to summon the Russian ambassador to the State Department.
“The Russian ambassador and the Russian government need to know that they cannot get away with this,” he told the BBC.
During the trial, the three men were held in a black-barred cage, guarded by soldiers with covered faces and armbands bearing the pro-Russian “Z” symbol, before being ordered to stand while the verdict was read to them, one of them showed Video from the courtroom released by the RIA Novosti news agency.
The hasty trial took place mostly behind closed doors, with information about the trial leaked to select Russian state media agencies.
Less than 24 hours before sentencing, Pinner and Saadoun had pleaded guilty to acts aimed at seizing power by force, according to a video shared from the court by RIA Novosti news agency. Aslin appeared to have pleaded guilty to a lesser charge involving weapons and explosives.
“The evidence presented by the prosecution in this case enabled the court to reach a guilty verdict, not to mention the fact that all of the defendants, without exception, have pleaded guilty to all charges,” Judge Alexander Nikulin told reporters in court after the Hand over the verdict.
“In delivering the verdict, the court was guided not only by the prescribed norms and rules, but also by the most important, unshakable principle of justice that made it possible to take this complex and difficult decision to apply an exceptional measure of punishment in the form of the death penalty,” he added.
UNKNOWN CONDITION
The DPR is one of two breakaway Russian-backed entities in eastern Ukraine’s Donbass region that Russia says it is fighting to liberate from Ukrainian forces.
Three days before beginning its invasion of Ukraine on February 24, Russia recognized them as independent states, which Ukraine and the West condemned as illegal.
The UK does not recognize the DPR and the UK has not communicated publicly with local officials about the case.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said earlier this week that should London take the case directly to the DPR, it could amount to a de facto recognition of the region’s independence.
British citizens Aslin, 28, and Pinner, 48, were captured by Russian-backed forces in Mariupol in April during a bitter struggle for control of the city. Their families say they have both been living in Ukraine since 2018. read more
Moroccan Saadoun surrendered in March while fighting in a small town between Mariupol and the regional capital, Donetsk.
Moroccan authorities have not commented on the case since his arrest.
After stumbling on the capital, Kyiv, in their initial advance, Russian forces and their proxies have refocused on the south-eastern Donbass region, and in recent weeks have established a so-called “land corridor” between Russia and the Crimean peninsula, which they announced in 2014 annexed by Ukraine.
Sign up now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com
to register
Reporting by Reuters bureaus; Edited by Alex Richardson
Our standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.