A Briton, a Croat and a Swede captured in Mariupol face the death penalty. The trial will resume in October.
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Moscow-backed separatist authorities in the Donetsk region have begun judging three Britons, a Croat and a Swede, Monday August 15. They are accused of having fought for the Ukrainian army as “mercenaries”, which could earn some of them a death sentence.
The Croatian, Swedish and one of the British prisoners were taken prisoner in the area of the Ukrainian port of Mariupol, which had been besieged and bombarded for weeks by the Russian army. All three risk the death penalty, according to the Russian State agency Ria Novosti (in Russian), which specifies that they are prosecuted for attempting to “seize power by force” and for “participation in an armed conflict in as a mercenary”.
Of the two remaining British prisoners, one is accused of mercenary activity, and the other of “having participated in the recruitment of mercenaries” for Ukraine. The five have pleaded not guilty, according to Russian state news agency TASS. The trial will resume in early October, TASS said, without giving any explanation. They are not the first foreign soldiers to be threatened with death by the separatist authorities: in early June, two British and a Moroccan had already been sentenced to death, before appealing.