Belarus court sentences 12 for role in Machulishchy airfield explosions, including main suspect in absentia
A Minsk city court has sentenced 12 individuals involved in the Machulishchy military airfield explosions that damaged a Russian A-50 airborne warning and control system aircraft last March. According to Belarus's General Prosecutor’s Office, sentences range from 2 years and 3 months to 25 years of imprisonment. The human rights group Viasna notes that most defendants received verdicts in absentia but did not specify whom. The trial was conducted in closed sessions.
Charges against ten of the accused—Shvets N.V., Azarov A.A., Yakutyuk V.K., Demin M.M., Sokolov D.V., Tochytskaya E.L., Loparev S.A., Lopatin M.A., Yatsuta A.N., and Sychev O.I.—included terrorism, deliberate incapacitating of an aircraft, high treason, espionage, among other crimes. Two others—Stepurko A.A. and Pilko A.A.—faced charges for financing terrorism and involvement in an extremist formation.
Ukrainian national Nikolay Shvets was identified as the main suspect and labeled the "perpetrator of the terrorist act" by prosecutors. He was sentenced to 25 years in absentia, having been exchanged back in June with Ukraine for the Metropolis Tulychensky and Bratslavsky Jonafan, a hierarch of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church formerly known as Anatoly Yeletskiy. The clergyman was serving a five-year sentence for offenses aimed at the territorial integrity of Ukraine and actions to overthrow the constitutional order, as well as justifying Russia's military aggression.