Finland: Sentence reduced for Russian convicted of war crimes

 

TT-AFP

 

Published 14.14

 

Image from when the trial against the man began in the Finnish capital Helsinki in December 2024. Photo: Heikki Saukkomaa/AP/TT

The Helsinki Court of Appeal has reduced the sentence for a Russian man who was sentenced to life imprisonment in Finland in March last year for war crimes committed in Ukraine in 2014.

The crimes in question were committed in Luhansk in eastern Ukraine in September 2014, when Russia-backed separatists had taken control of parts of the region. According to the prosecutor, the man was deputy commander of the Russian paramilitary force Rusich, which is labeled a terrorist group in Ukraine and is notorious for its brutality and neo-Nazi ideology.

However, the Helsinki Court of Appeal considers that the evidence is insufficient for some of the crimes and thus changes the sentence from life imprisonment to twelve years and six months.