A judge who was involved in the deportation of a Crimean citizen from the territory of the temporarily occupied peninsula was sentenced to 10 years in prison in absentia. According to Babel, this is about Larysa Lykhachova, who after the annexation of Crimea became a judge of the Russian-controlled Armenian City Court.
She was found guilty of violating the laws and customs of war (Part 1 of Article 438 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine), the Prosecutorʼs Office of Crimea reports.
After the occupation of the peninsula, the "judge" transferred to the service of illegally created judicial bodies and assumed the leadership position of the head of the Armenian City Court of the Republic of Crimea."
"Judge" reliably knew that since 2014 the residents of Crimea have the status of people who are under the protection of international humanitarian law. Contrary to this, it made a decision to expel a citizen of Ukraine from the territory of the temporarily occupied peninsula.
The illegal decision was motivated by the alleged lack of permit documents and non-observance of the "rules of staying on the territory of the Russian Federation". However, no additional permits of the occupation administration of the Russian Federation in Crimea for the residence of Ukrainian citizens are provided.
"This is the first sentence in Ukraine for the deportation of the civilian population from the occupied peninsula. A kind of precedent in the national legal system. We see how the consistent and persistent work of the autonomyʼs law enforcement agencies destroys the myth of "impunity of the occupying power in Crimea," noted the head of the Prosecutorʼs Office of the Republic of Crimea Ihor Ponochovny.
- Currently, three more indictments on similar crimes are being considered by the courts. The International Criminal Court was also sent three informative reports with evidence of the mass expulsion of Ukrainian citizens from the temporarily occupied peninsula.