Party of Regions MP Vadym Kolesnichenko charged with suspicion of high treason
Former MP of Ukraine, who until 2014 was the deputy head of the Party of Regions faction in parliament, Vadym Kolesnichenko, was in absentia charged with suspicion under several articles of the Criminal Code, including high treason.
The Department of Internal Security of the National Police of Ukraine reported this.
The department does not name the MP, but notes that he was a MP of Ukraine of the IV-VII convocations of the parliament "from a currently banned political party", and also ran for the post of mayor of Sevastopol. The fugitive MP can also be recognized in the photo published by law enforcement officers.
"Law enforcement officers established that after early resignation of his parliamentary powers, the man moved to the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and actively helped the invaders in the annexation of the peninsula. There, he headed the local Rodina party and received a Russian passport. The defector politician even tried to run for the position of "governor" of occupied Sevastopol, but his political ambitions were never realized," the report states.
According to the National Police, since the beginning of russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Kolesnichenko continued to spread hostile narratives, helping the aggressor state carry out subversive activities against Ukraine.
"In his public speeches, the traitor repeatedly justified Russia's war crimes, denied Ukrainian statehood, and humiliated the Ukrainian people," the National Police note.
The former MP is charged with high treason, inciting national hatred and justifying the armed aggression of the russian federation against Ukraine. He faces 15 years in prison or life imprisonment.
As previously reported, thanks to the SSU, Ukraine nationalized the property of the Gauleiter of Zaporizhzhia Yevhen Balytskyi for over UAH 120 million. The High Anti-Corruption Court granted the claim of the Ministry of Justice to seize the assets of collaborator Yevhen Balytskyi to the income of Ukraine.