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Two Convicted Russian Killers Caught Trying to Hide in Ukraine’s Capital
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Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) detained two Russian soldiers previously convicted of murder after they deserted their positions on the front lines, changed into civilian clothing, and attempted to reach Kyiv, where they reportedly planned to hide with relatives.
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According to the SBU on October 28, the two men served under contract with Russia’s 291st Motorized Rifle Regiment of the Southern Military District. Ukrainian counterintelligence officers intercepted them at a checkpoint near the border between the Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk regions.
Both soldiers were traveling in civilian clothes in a vehicle they had stopped while hitchhiking. During the inspection, security officers discovered a Russian military identification tag around the neck of one of the detainees.
Investigators established that one of the men was a resident of temporary occupied Dovzhansk in Ukraine’s Luhansk region who had been convicted of murder twice.
He had reportedly fought against Ukrainian forces since 2016 and later participated in battles near Bakhmut following Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, serving as an assistant gunner for an anti-tank missile system.
The second detainee was a Russian citizen who signed a military contract with Russia’s Defense Ministry while serving a prison sentence for murder.
According to the SBU, both men had recently been deployed to assault Ukrainian positions in the Kramatorsk sector of the front. However, they abandoned their positions and entered a settlement in the contested gray zone between Russian and Ukrainian forces.
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There, the soldiers reportedly found civilian clothing inside an abandoned house, buried their Russian military uniforms and issued weapons, and continued on foot toward a nearby town.
During their journey, they persuaded a passing driver to take them to Dnipro, from where they intended to travel onward to Kyiv. Their journey ended when Ukrainian security officers detained them at a checkpoint before they could reach Dnipro.
In a separate case, Ukraine’s Security Service reported on October 15 that a Russian soldier who fled his positions and changed into civilian clothes was charged with killing five unarmed Ukrainian servicemen and a civilian in the Kharkiv region. He faces life imprisonment if convicted.
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