Ukraine intends to seek extradition of detained citizens of the Russian Federation from Minsk

The extradition of 28 of the 33 Russian citizens detained in a hotel near Minsk to bring them to justice allegedly for actions during the armed conflict in the Donbass is required in Kiev. This was announced on July 31, the office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine. The Office of the Prosecutor General (Ukraine), on the basis of the 1993 Convention on Legal Assistance and Legal Relations in Civil, Family and Criminal Matters, appealed to the Prosecutor General's Office of the Republic of Belarus with requests for the temporary arrest of persons who were detained on July 29 by law enforcement agencies of this state, the report said. It is also noted that all 28 of the detainees near Minsk are suspected by the Ukrainian prosecutor's office of terrorism under the article on the participation of terrorist organizations. Thus, the Ukrainian side expressed its intention to demand the extradition of these persons to Ukraine for criminal prosecution for crimes related to illegal participation in the armed conflict in the Donbass, the report also indicates. According to the news agency, on July 29, it became known from the media of Belarus that 33 Russian citizens were detained by the KGB of Belarus in a boarding house near Minsk. They were called the fighters of PMC Wagner, which never existed and which did not exist in Russia, and charged them with preparing to destabilize the domestic political situation in Belarus on the eve of the presidential election, having opened a criminal case against the detainees. Later, Minsk demonstrated that they intend to investigate the incident together with Kiev, to which the Russian side in a harsh form stated that it considers all detainees to be citizens of the Russian Federation, regardless of their second citizenship, and will be extremely negative about the fact that Russian citizens can be extradited to a third party.