Murders, rapes, looting, hundreds of bodies discovered in the middle of the streets or buried in mass graves: the Boutcha massacre, north of kyiv, continues to mark the spirits after more than a month of war in Ukraine. If Russian President Vladimir Putin called Wednesday a “crude and cynical provocation” of the Ukrainian authorities these macabre discoveries after the withdrawal of forces from Moscow, a group of Ukrainian activists claims to have found the name of the leader of the Russian battalion which occupied the area: Azatbek Omurbekov. Already nicknamed the “butcher of Boutcha”, he is suspected of having orchestrated the rape, pillage and massacre of hundreds of Ukrainian civilians.
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This officer, in his forties, leads the 64th Russian Motorized Rifle Brigade, based in a small town in the Russian Far East. His battalion, made up of about 1,600 men, was installed in Boutcha for more than a month until March 30, the day they began their withdrawal towards Russia. A retreat but perhaps not an escape: according to intelligence services, Omurbekov and his battalion n°51 460 are currently near the city of Belgorod, on the Russian side of the border, and are preparing to redeploy to the city of Kharkiv.
This is Omurbekov Azatbek Asanbekovich the commander of unit 54 160 who committed the #Bucha massacre.
In #Russiathe mothers of soldiers denounced the violence that reigned in this unit, the hazing, extortion, and the arbitrary power of these commanders. pic.twitter.com/W3aAkVcLcv— Russian war crimes (@WCrimesRussian) April 5, 2022
This lieutenant-colonel, whose face is now spread over part of the Internet, has already raged in Ukraine in 2014, where he had been reported, at the time, in Crimea and in the Donbass. At the end of 2021, just before leaving for operations, he was then blessed by the Orthodox Church and then slipped these words in front of the bishop in charge of the celebration: “These are not our most important weapons, history shows that most of our battles are won with our souls“. As if he had entered Ukraine in the name of God.
November 8, 2021.
The commander of military unit 51460, lieutenant colonel #Omurbekov Azatbek, is awarded the Diploma of Bishophttps://t.co/HioO2On06X pic.twitter.com/SRd9cXPBV8—InformNapalm (@InformNapalm) April 7, 2022
Since the revelations of the abuses committed in Boutcha, and in the vein of the war crimes denounced by kyiv and part of the international community since the Russian offensive in Ukraine, launched on February 24, 2022, many activists have been trying to find traces, clues. And it’s a group of Ukrainians who traced the name of Omurbekov.
Nicknamed “InformNapalm“, they say they have worked on the basis of open access intelligence documents, OpenSource Intelligence (Osint), and in this case, a leak from the well-known group of hackers, Anonymous. The latter, known to the general public for their Guy Fawkes masks, recently published a list of names: all belonging to this battalion 51,460. Problem: this list dates from 2018 and is not entirely up to date. does not appear because he was appointed in 2021, but, with a series of cross-checks, they came back to him… In particular with this blessing in November (see tweet above).
These Ukrainian activists did not only publish his name: his photo also with his starry khaki cap, which testifies to his rank. And then, “InformNapalm” also went so far as to put his postal address, his e-mail address and even his mobile phone number online. They also say they tried to call him: relatives were on the phone, saying they hadn’t heard from him for several days.