Court left Colonel Chervinsky in custody until February 10, 2024
On 13 December, the Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv extended the pre-trial restraint for Colonel Roman Chervinsky. Chervinsky will be held in custody for another 60 days until 10 February 2024 without the right to bail.
This was reported by Censor.NET with reference to Suspilne.
The court also ordered the head of the SSU pre-trial investigation department to provide the suspect with the necessary treatment and nutrition due to his deteriorating health
Before that, Chervinsky's lawyers had filed a motion to disqualify the judge, but were denied.
Prosecutors requested a closed session without the media. The court rejected the prosecutors' request and the hearing will continue in open session.
The prosecution then requested that a letter from the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, be attached. The content is unknown. The defence lawyers asked the court for 15 minutes to read the motion and the letter from Zaluzhnyi. The court adjourned the hearing. Chervinsky was given the opportunity to read the letter from the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces.
The lawyer opposed the attachment of the letter, because, in his opinion, the prosecutor was substituting witnesses. Also, according to the defence, it contains information that is not relevant to the case. Chervinsky noted that the real letter from Zaluzhnyi has a different number than the number of the letter with questions from the prosecutor's office. Chervinsky accused the prosecutors of fabrication.
The lawyers asked to question the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and another witness in court. Human rights defender Ludmila Kusa explained that earlier the defence had appealed to the Office of the Prosecutor General to question Zaluzhnyi, but they were denied. According to her, the investigating judge later granted the request and allowed the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces to be summoned for questioning. The lawyers waited, reminding him with letters about the need to summon Zaluzhnyi, but this was allegedly never done.
Prosecutors objected to summoning Zaluzhnyi because it was not a hearing on the merits. The court rejected the lawyers' request to summon the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
The prosecutor pointed out that, according to the investigation, Roman Chervinsky did not hold a position that allowed him to carry out intelligence activities while serving in the Special Operations Forces.
Investigators also said that Chervinsky was involved in Telegram correspondence with Russian military officer Nosenko. In the course of this correspondence, it was planned to land a Russian Aerospace Forces Su-34 aircraft at Kanatove (this is the first time this has been mentioned).
According to the investigation, Chervinsky issued an order asking to send 20 members of the Armed Forces for training (it is not specified what kind of training) at the Kanatove airfield, which indicates that Chervinsky was considering this airfield for a possible landing.
The prosecutor stated that the Russian army serviceman was provided with information about the Kanatove airfield to land the aircraft, as a result of which the occupiers attacked with 9 missiles, 8 of which fell on the territory of the airfield. It has been established that these were Iskander and X-22 missiles. The attack killed a soldier, injured a number of servicemen, and damaged aircraft and property at the airfield.
"Thus, Chervinsky carried out a set of actions to carry out measures coordinated in terms of purpose, tasks, place and time to create conditions for the transfer of a military aircraft of the Russian Armed Forces to the Armed Forces of Ukraine," the prosecution said. The investigation has conducted more than 20 examinations that testify to the damage caused.
According to the prosecutor, Chervinsky was allegedly warned about counter-intelligence measures within the framework of this operation by the Russian Federal Security Service. In the letter quoted by the prosecutor, Zaluzhnyi stated that he had not created the relevant group. The commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces also noted that he did not order the operation because the SSU had not given its approval.
"Chervinsky, acting intentionally, that is, without coordination and coordination of his actions with the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine or another intelligence agency, that is, clearly exceeding the power and official authority granted to him as a military officer, in the period from July 2022 to 22.07.22, passed the information to military officials...", the prosecution added.
The prosecution is demanding detention without bail.
In turn, Kusa's counsel asked to change the jurisdiction from the Security Service of Ukraine to the State Bureau of Investigation. The defence also stated that the SSU hospital was not providing the necessary medical treatment due to the deterioration of Chervinsky's condition.
The lawyer argued that Chervinsky did not exceed his duties, and all his actions were coordinated step by step. According to her, the intelligence actions were carried out by an authorised SSU officer and Chervinsky did not take any actions on his own. Kusa pointed out that there was no evidence that the SSU had banned the operation, and Zaluzhnyi allegedly knew about the operation.
In addition, the human rights activist said that prior to this case, Kanatove airfield had been shelled twice, which led to damage. According to Kusa, the case indicates the amount of damage at 45 million hryvnias, but it does not specify or make it clear how the investigation divided the damage.
Another of Chervinsky's lawyers, referring to the interrogation of witnesses, stated that the commander of the Air Force, Mykola Oleshchuk, was aware of the operation. In addition, he added, the Air Command "Centre" and its head were involved, and the operation was reported orally to the then head of the SSU, Ivan Bakanov, who also involved the SSU counterintelligence service.
Earlier, the media reported that the Ukrainian military had been recruiting a Russian pilot for several months to hijack the plane. According to media reports, Roman Chervinsky was among them. Subsequently, as the SSU noted, the "operation" was carried out over the objections of the SSU and without the consent of the relevant state authorities. As a result, the enemy received information about the deployment of personnel of the Ukrainian Air Force and Ukrainian aircraft at the Kanatove airfield. This allowed the Russian Armed Forces to shell the airfield.
Later, Chervinsky gave Censor.NET an exclusive interview in which he spoke about the operation at Kanatove airfield.
In April 2023, the SSU served Chervinsky with a notice of suspicion in the case of the shelling of the Kanatove airfield in Kirovohrad region by the occupiers. He was detained in the Ternopil region.
Major General Viktor Hanushchak, who was in charge of the military unit to which Colonel Chervinsky was assigned as deputy commander, told Censor.NET that the operation at Kanatove airfield had been agreed with the top leadership of the Armed Forces. However, the court refused to hear Hanushchak and did not accept evidence in favour of Chervinsky.
Roman Chervinskyi was one of the intelligence officers who organised an operation in 2020 to detain Russian mercenaries from the "Wagner" PMC, luring them to Belarus. There, the mercenaries were supposed to board a plane that would later be crash-landed in Ukraine by the Ukrainian special services. However, the operation failed. On 24 June 2021, President Zelenskyy confirmed the preparation of a special operation against the Wagnerites. Zelenskyy also said that the special operation against the Wagnerites was the idea of other countries and that Ukraine was involved in this issue as much as possible.
In December 2021, DIU intelligence officers Chervinsky and Semeniuk spoke about the betrayal of the operation. According to Chervinsky, several people from the President's Office could have leaked information about the operation to detain the Wagnerites. He also said that the Presidential Office threatened the ex-intelligence officers with criminal proceedings.
