In St Petersburg, Ukrainian national has been sentenced to 15 years for alleged sabotage and espionage
In St Petersburg, a Russian court has sentenced Artem Prokopets, a 29-year-old Ukrainian national, to 15 years’ imprisonment on charges of sabotage and espionage. The Russian authorities claim that the man was acting on instructions from SSU officers and was involved in the bombing and arson attacks on transformers.
According to Censor.NET, Russian media outlets report this, citing the press office of the courts in St Petersburg.
According to a Russian court ruling, Prokopets is to spend the first four years in prison and the remainder of his sentence in a maximum-security prison. He was also fined 350,000 roubles, and the court ordered the confiscation of over 387,000 roubles and two mobile phones.
According to the Russian investigation, a Ukrainian national has allegedly been residing illegally in the Russian Federation since 2018, most recently living in St Petersburg and the Leningrad Oblast.
The Russian side claims that between May 2023 and May 2024, he exchanged correspondence with members of the Security Service of Ukraine. One of them allegedly gave him tasks to carry out, for which he was paid in cryptocurrency.
Prokopets was charged with arson and the detonation of three transformers – in the Vsevolozhsky District of the Leningrad Region and on Ekaterininsky Prospekt in St Petersburg in June 2023 and April 2024.
According to the Russian court, the losses arising from the first incident amounted to almost 27,000 roubles, whilst those resulting from damage to two further transformers totalled over 15 million roubles. However, no civil claims were brought against the Ukrainian national.
Russian security forces also claim that the man was gathering information on key facilities in St Petersburg’s oil industry and fuel and energy sector and passing it on to third parties.
A Russian court has found Prokopets guilty of espionage, sabotage, aiding and abetting sabotage, and the unlawful possession of explosives. The court’s statement asserts that the Ukrainian man pleaded guilty.
News of Prokopets’s arrest emerged in July 2024. Initially, he was charged only with sabotage in connection with the explosion of ‘Rosseti Lenenergo’ transformers on Ekaterininsky Prospekt.
Following that incident, several districts in St Petersburg and the Leningrad Region were left without power. At the time, the power company itself cited a ‘technical fault’ as the cause of the power cuts, whilst the Krasnogvardeisky District administration reported a short circuit at a substation.
