Russian invaders sentence Ukrainian pensioner to 12.5 years after torturing out ‘confession’ to links with 'British spies'
The renowned Memorial Support for Political Prisoners Project has demanded the release of Serhiy Chebukin, a 62-year-old Ukrainian pensioner from occupied Kherson oblast, sentenced by an occupation ‘court’ to twelve and a half years on cynical ‘treason’ charges. These pertained solely to two (alleged) donations to help the Armed Forces defending his country but appear to have been laid long after Chebukin was forced, probably through torture, to make even more surreal allegations about ‘British spies’.
Chebukin’s alleged ‘trial’, together with the 12.5-year sentence, were first announced on 6 February 2025 by the so-called ‘prosecutor’ in occupied Kherson oblast. Here, as in a terrifying number of cases, Russia has first made it impossible to live, work, receive healthcare, etc. on occupied territory without accepting Russian citizenship, and then used such citizenship as pretext for bringing charges of ‘state treason’ against the aggressor state, under Article 275 of Russia’s criminal code. Chebkin had been found ‘guilty’ by the occupation ‘Kherson regional court’ “of state treason, committed via financial assistance to a foreign state for activities directed against the security of the Russian Federation.” The supposedly ‘foreign state’ was, of course, Ukraine, and specifically Ukraine’s Armed Forces. Chebukin was claimed to have used a mobile app in March and May 2023 to send two money transfers to a Ukrainian citizen’s account, with the prosecution asserting that this was to provide financial aid to Ukraine’s Armed Forces.
This was deemed sufficient for an anonymous ‘judge’ from an illegitimate occupation ‘court’ to sentence Serhiy Chebukin (b. 1 July 1963) to twelve and a half years in a maximum -security (‘harsh-regime’) prison colony where the appalling conditions are difficult to endure even for men considerably younger than Chebukin. This was, supposedly, should the 62-year-old survive, to be followed by a further 18 months of restricted liberty, with a large 350 thousand rouble fine also imposed.
Russia has used ‘treason’ or other equally absurd charges against Ukrainians from occupied territory, with at least two very young men sentenced to long terms of imprisonment for donations made as teenagers.
This case differs only in that the Russians appear to have first planned different charges against Chebukin, charges linked with bizarre allegations about Britain and its supposed use of Ukrainian refugees for ‘spying’.
On 21 February 2024, Russia’s state-controlled TASS agency published a text based on allegations linked with Chebukin under the quite stunning headline: “The FSB have uncovered cases of intelligence work by the British Council in the interests of Kyiv”. Russia’s security service alleged that Chebukin “had fallen under the influence of the organization but that he had realized that he was being drawn into criminal activities and had turned to the enforcement bodies”. The surreal claim that the UK was carrying out ‘intelligence work’, using the British Council as a front, was based solely on a videoed ‘confession’ from Chebukin released by the FSB. Although very slightly different in content, with Chebukin here claimed to have voluntarily gone to the FSB, it is otherwise identical to countless other such ‘confessions’ extracted from men and women held incommunicado, totally under FSB control, without a lawyer. There is every reason to assume that Chebukin was forced into making bizarre allegations, and then issuing ‘a warning’ to others, with neither age, nor gender, ever stopping the FSB from using physical torture, as well as threats of huge sentences. Since the video begins with Chebukin explaining about his pro-Ukrainian position, his support for Maidan [the Euromaidan protests in 2013/14] and for Ukraine’s Armed Forces, it is, effectively, certain that he was already imprisoned, and not, as claimed, a person who can voluntarily offered information to the FSB. He talks about having, in 2019, become acquainted on the Internet with somebody called Svitlana Voloshina. She had, after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine moved to the UK. It is at this point that the story becomes openly absurd, with the claim being that Voloshina began working for ‘the British Council’ which is described as “a British intelligence organization” working for the British Security Service.
The British Council is, of course, nothing of the kind, but an organization with charitable status in the UK which encourages cultural, scientific, technological and educational cooperation and supports cultural and educational initiatives. The funding for this is either from the British government or from the language courses which the British Council offers wherever it is based. The nonsense about its supposed use for intelligence work, and the claims about refugees in the UK being effectively forced into collaboration are especially absurd since the British Council has never had an office in Kherson oblast.
If, at the beginning, it was not necessarily obvious that Chebukin was speaking under duress, the final allegations and ‘warning’ sound as though he is trying to recite what he has been made to learn off by heart. He says that he was asked in the summer of 2023 to send coordinates of places where the Russian military were deployed and that he had understood that they were using him “to get intelligence information in the interests of the British Council. Voloshina told me how hard it is for Ukrainian refugees to remain in Great Britain, that they keep only those who are useful and do what the authorities say. The others are sent away. I want to warn residents of Kherson oblast who make contact with the British Council. They use data in order to carry out attacks on our cities and villages. The British fixers don’t give a damn about the death of civilians.”
Ukraine’s Centre for Journalist Investigations suggests that these deranged allegations may have been because Ukraine had achieved some serious attacks on the invaders’ positions, with the use of HIMARS missiles.
This is not the first time that the FSB have shown total disregard for fundamental discrepancies. In February 2024, there was, in theory, no reason for Chebukin, who was claimed to have come forward himself, to be in custody. He almost certainly was, with the Russians, almost a year later, handing down a horrifically long sentence over two, probably modest, donations to Ukraine’s Armed Forces.
See also:
Russia stages terror arrests in occupied Zaporizhzhia oblast for donations to Ukraine’s Armed Forces
Roman Hryhorian
Ukrainian seized in Crimea and sentenced to 12 years for donations to Ukraine's defenders
Liudmyla Kolesnikova
Serhiy Shtyrov
60-year-old from Russian-occupied Donbas sentenced to 13 years for donations to Ukraine’s defenders
Two women from Enerhodar sentenced to 14 years: Lilia Kazhkariova and S.N. Dovhopola, who was put on ‘trial’ and sentenced to 14 years for donations to the military unit in which her son is serving.
Kateryna Korovina Forced 'to wake up a foreign citizen in her own country’. Kateryna Korovina sentenced to 10 years for opposing Russia’s occupation
Ivan Semykoz Russia sentences Ukrainian to 8.5 years for donation as a teenager to Ukraine’s Azov Regiment
Stanislav Rudenko Chilling surveillance methods as Russia sentences Ukrainian to 10 years for donation to defend Ukraine