According to occupation sources, a 50-year-old resident of Askmesdzhit (Simferopol) was found guilty of allegedly arriving in Ak’yar (Sevastopol), where he retrieved more than 1.4 kg of explosive material and an explosive device from a hiding place with the intent to transport them and relay their coordinates.
The occupying security forces stated that the man was detained and charged with “treason” as well as the illegal possession of explosive materials. The case was heard by a Russian-controlled court in the territory of the temporarily occupied Crimea.
The sentence calls for 17 years of imprisonment in a maximum-security penal colony. As in other similar cases, the details of the investigation and the evidence are not publicly available, and the trial itself took place behind closed doors and without adequate guarantees of a fair trial.
The Crimean Tatar Resource Center notes that such sentences are part of a systematic practice of politically motivated persecution on the occupied peninsula. Russian-controlled courts in Crimea regularly use charges of “treason” and “espionage” as a tool to pressure and intimidate the local population.