The occupiers “sentenced” an OSCE employee to 13 years in Luhansk region

The so-called “supreme court” of the “LPR” sentenced OSCE employee Dmytro Shabanov, who was a security assistant at the missionʼs Stakhanov forward patrol base, to 13 years in prison.

This is reported by media under the control of the Kremlin.

Shabanov was detained in mid-April this year. He was accused of "transferring information to representatives of foreign special services" and "treason". The Russian occupiers said that Shabanov was "recruited by a resident of the American CIA in Ukraine" who allegedly worked for the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU). Shabanov is also accused of "undergoing special training in the USA."

After February 24, four local members of the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission were detained in occupied Donetsk and Luhansk, but one was later released. Two of the detainees are being tried by the occupiers, and the third has been detained for almost five months.

The reaction of the OSCE

On September 15, the current head of the OSCE, the head of the Polish Foreign Ministry, Zbigniew Rau, and the OSCE Secretary General, Helga Maria Schmid, condemned the legal proceedings against the OSCE members and called for the immediate release of all three members of the mission. They called on the OSCE participating States to increase pressure on the persons responsible for their detention.

• The OSCE SMM was formed at the end of March 2014 at the request of Ukraine. The mission worked in Donbas. At the end of April 2022, the OSCE decided to end the work of the Special Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, as Russia blocked its continuation.
• Local OSCE employees who worked in Donbas were left without the organizationʼs protectorate.