Odesa
Woman collects money for Russian occupiers: Eleven years in prison
An aerial view shows damaged private houses, shell and rocket craters in the Donetsk suburbs. photo
© Efrem Lukatsky/AP
A Ukrainian woman has to go to prison for a good eleven years. She organized a call for funding for militants in the Russian-held Donetsk region.
In southern Ukraine, a woman in the Odessa region on the Black Sea has been sentenced to more than 11 years in prison for collecting money for the Russian occupiers, according to the verdict. This was announced by the Ukrainian domestic secret service SBU and published evidence on its Telegram channel.
The woman organized a call for funding for the fighters in the Russian-occupied Donetsk region on social networks. She was arrested in December during an operation aimed against saboteurs. The court sentenced her to eleven years and four months in prison for supporting the aggressor state, it said.
Two relatives supported
The woman supported two relatives who joined the separatists in Donetsk region in 2016 to fight against Ukrainian forces. Fighting in eastern Ukraine began in 2014 after the fall of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych.
The woman’s relatives joined Moscow’s troops after the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine a good 15 months ago in order to occupy the city of Mariupol and parts of the Cherson region, it said. The SBU secret service repeatedly reports arrests of collaborators who support Russia.