Girkin confirms Russian involvement in Donbas, admits to numerous executions

Russian terrorist Igor Girkin, who was among the leaders
of the 2014 Russian military invasion of Ukraine, gave an interview – broadcast
live on YouTube – on May 18 to Dmitry Gordon, among the most well-known
journalists in the Russian-speaking world who is based in Kyiv. In the
interview, Girkin confirmed facts that are already widely known: that Russia
has been directly involved in occupying Donbas from the very beginning, and
that closing the border with Russia in Donbas – a precondition being demanded
by President Zelensky for local elections – would lead to the end of the
occupation there. The Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) “is a gray zone that is
fully governed from outside. It is being governed disgustingly at that. And
disgusting people by their moral and business qualities. From outside – that’s from
the Russian Federation,” Girkin told Gordon. Long known for his disapproval for
Russia’s handling of Donbas, Girkin reiterated his view that the government
“sold out” the separatist fighters who were seeking to create a Novorossiya
state in southeastern Ukraine.

 

Among his new admissions, Girkin said “it came down
to” organizing a military tribunal in occupied Donbas that sentenced citizens
of Ukraine to death. He said he ordered the execution of numerous people, including
Yuriy Popravko, a 19-year-old university student from Kyiv; Yuriy Diakovskiy, a
25-year-old volunteer fighter from Ukraine; and Volodymyr Rybak, a member of
the Horlivka City Council. He said he ordered the execution of numerous
Ukrainian fighters out of military uniform, whom he considered to be saboteurs.
He imprisoned those captured Ukrainians in uniform. He said he also ordered the
execution of three fighters in the Donetsk army for looting, torture and
kidnapping. He said he had executed local residents for looting, possessing
firearms and cooperating with Ukrainian soldiers. He admitted to personally
executing numerous people.  During the interview, Girkin didn’t rule out
that he would be killed for his admissions or be prosecuted at the International
Criminal Court in the Hague, which he doesn’t recognize as legitimate.

 

A native of Moscow, the 50-year-old Girkin
participated in Russian military operations in Transnistria, Bosnia and
Herzegovina, and both the military campaigns in Chechnya. He cooperated with
the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) between 1996 and 2013, according to
the snob.ru news site. In February 2014, he served as an adviser to Sergey
Aksyonov, who has been the Russian-backed leader in Crimea since then. He
arrived in Donetsk in April, serving as the leader of military forces between
May and August 2014. He returned to live in Russia that month. He faces a
series of criminal charges from the Ukrainian government, including creating a
terrorist group or organization, committing terrorist acts, and illegal seizure
of government buildings. He is among four Donbas fighters charged with the July
2014 missile attack on passenger flight MH17, which killed 298 civilian
passengers flying from The Netherlands to Malaysia. He has been placed under
E.U. and U.S. sanctions.

 

Besides Girkin, Gordon conducted a live interview on
May 12 with Natalia Poklonskaya, who served as the first prosecutor general of
Russian-occupied Crimea between March 2014 and October 2016. In this interview,
she admitted that agents with the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Russian
Armed Forces approved her appointment as prosecutor general. She struck a
remorseful tone in her remarks, expressing warm sentiments for Ukraine and the
language, even singing a folk song in Ukrainian. Currently a Russian State Duma
deputy (elected in 2016), she offered to serve as the Russian ambassador to
Ukraine because she believes she is capable of reconciling the two nations. She
was placed under E.U. and U.S. sanctions in 2014.

 

In his defense from criticism, Gordon said he
conducted the controversial interviews having gained approval in advance from
the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU). He said the interview offered valuable
information for intelligence services, as well as those prosecuting Girkin,
particularly in The Hague. He said he has forward them the recordings. Gordon
also stressed his consistent record of criticizing Russian aggression in
Ukraine and supporting Ukraine’s Euro-Atlantic integration. Deputy Prosecutor
General of Ukraine Giunduz Mamedov thanked Gordon afterwards for the Girkin
interview for providing more evidence of his criminal activity. Meanwhile, the
SBU said it is examining the interviews.

 

Gordon drew heavy criticism from Ukraine’s pro-Western
forces for conducting and publicizing the interview with Girkin. European
Solidarity MP Mykola Kniazhytskiy, also the general director of the Espreso
television news network, told parliament on May 19 the SBU cooperating with
Gordon for such interviews is a violation of journalistic ethics and raises the
question of how many journalists have such arrangements. Moreover, the SBU
shouldn’t be involved in justifying Russian aggression, he said, accusing
Gordon and media that reprinted the interview of supporting terrorism “since
any popularization of terrorism is in fact promoting terrorism and grounds for
criminal charges.” Up to nationalists gathered at Gordon’s editorial office the
night of May 18 to protest the interview, vandalizing the building and adjacent
sidewalk with insulting graffiti.

 

Zenon Zawada: The very
fact that Gordon, a journalist based in Kyiv, interviewed Girkin and
Poklonskaya has overshadowed any of the information that emerged, which didn’t
reveal many new facts and hasn’t changed much of anything in the conflict.
Gordon himself admitted that he thinks the Poklonskaya interview was approved
by Russian intelligence officials, though he didn’t think they approved the
Girkin interview. Yet they share the same character of being confessions of
wrongdoing.

 

In this sense, we share the view that such interviews
threaten Ukraine’s Euro-Atlantic integration prospects. That’s because they
enhance the risk of (1) normalizing public sentiment towards the overall
Russian occupation of Ukrainian lands, (2) preparing public sentiment for
making political and legal concessions on Donbas, (3) shifting responsibility
away from the Russian government for the crimes in Donbas onto seemingly rogue
criminals like Girkin, and (4) making these criminals appear sympathetic to the
Ukrainian public, particularly Poklonskaya, who has become an international
celebrity of sorts.

 

Gordon’s interview is part of an overall trend in
Ukraine – being promoted by the Zelensky administration – of thawing
hostilities and renewing cultural ties with Russia, opposing nationalist ideas
and rhetoric, advancing Russian narratives of its occupation of Ukraine and
searching for new alternatives to ending the war that involve some form of
concessions. A recent example of this is President Zelensky’s press office
granting accreditation to a planned May 20 press conference to the chief editor
of the sharij.net news site, which represents a fringe political party that is
hostile to the West. Meanwhile, pro-Western journalists from established
publications have been denied accreditation.

 

Ultimately, most of those involved in the interviews
got some benefit, including Gordon, Girkin, Poklonskaya, and, to some extent,
Ukrainian and international prosecutors. However, we see Ukraine’s security
service having harmed its credibility for allegedly cooperating with someone
like Gordon, who is notorious for his relentless publicity seeking.

 

Meanwhile, the Russian FSB succeeded in executing
what we view as a deliberate psychological operation to soften the public
sentiment in Ukraine to agree eventually to geopolitical concessions on Donbas.
What’s holding back such concessions are pro-Western activists and Ukraine’s
Western partners. Russia is actively trying to discredit these two political
players among the majority of the public.