The Finnish prosecutor's office has accused the Russian ultra-nationalist and former commander of the Rusič sabotage group, Voislav Torden, of war crimes committed in Ukraine in 2014, Radio Free Europe reports in English.
According to Finnish broadcaster Yle, Torden - also known as Jan Petrovski - faces five charges stemming from his involvement in the neo-Nazi paramilitary unit Rusich, which has been fighting Ukrainian forces in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of eastern Ukraine.
Deputy Chief Prosecutor Yuka Rape said Torden and his group were linked to the deaths of 22 Ukrainian soldiers and the wounding of four others. He was charged with violating the laws of war and cruelty to wounded and dead enemy combatants, according to the indictment cited by Yle.
Born Jan Petrovski in 1987 in St. Petersburg, Torden moved to Oslo, Norway with his mother in 2004. Then he regularly visited Russia, where he met former paratrooper and nationalist Aleksandar Milchakov. In 2014, they traveled to Ukraine's Donbass region to support pro-Russian separatists in their fight against Ukrainian forces.
In September 2014, Rusich ambushed a Ukrainian battalion, and Milchakov later bragged that he had photographed himself with the bodies of slain Ukrainian soldiers, while members of Rusich allegedly mutilated the remains of individual soldiers.
Torden was deported from Norway to Russia in 2016, where he changed his name from Jan Petrovski to Voislav Torden.
He entered Finland in 2023 as a family member of his wife, who received a study permit. Torden was detained in July of the same year at the Helsinki airport, while trying to board a flight to Nice, France.
After his arrest, Ukrainian authorities sought his extradition, but Finland's Supreme Court rejected the request, citing concerns about conditions in Ukrainian prisons and the possibility that Torden would face degrading treatment in custody.
Ukraine accused him of war crimes during the 2014-15 conflict, and the United States placed him under sanctions in 2022 for extreme cruelty during fighting in the Kharkiv region.
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