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ARTICLE - Hague witness of Russian War Crimes

Former GRU officer flees to Netherlands and is ready to witness at ICC
News Censor.NET World War in Ukraine
18.12.23 22:22
https://censor.net/en/news/3462369/former_gru_officer_flees_to_netherlands_and_is_ready_to_witness_at_icc

Former Russian intelligence colonel Igor Salikov, a 60-year-old man, managed to travel to The Hague in the Netherlands and wrote a letter to the International Criminal Court. The man is ready to talk about Russian war crimes from 2014 to the present.

According to Censor.NET, with reference to European Pravda, Salikov said this in an interview with the EenVandaag program of the Netherlands public broadcaster NPO 1.

Salikov claims to have served for 25 years, first in the Russian army, then in the private military company Wagner, on whose side he fought in Syria and several African countries. He was also involved in Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, first in 2014 and later in 2022.

The Russian has written a letter to the International Criminal Court, in which he describes his involvement in the annexation of Crimea and the activities of the “Donetsk People’s Republic”, including the falsification of the so-called referendum. He believes that Russian troops were then convinced to invade Ukraine “with the help of lies.”

Salikov also told the journalists that he witnessed Russian war crimes after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, including executions of civilians, torture of prisoners and kidnapping of children.

“I saw people from the special services taking a large number of children without parents across the Belarusian border,” the Russian said, adding that “whole convoys of FSS agents in private cars and small minibusses” were involved. But he does not know why the children were kidnapped.

According to Salikov, he was able to leave Russia last June with his family and settle for a while in Cyprus, where they were allegedly persecuted. Eventually, the Russian traveled to the Netherlands via Serbia and other countries and landed at Schiphol Airport on Monday, December 18, after which he declared his willingness to testify at the ICC.

The former Russian army officer claims that he can give valuable testimony to the court in The Hague about Russia’s war crimes and how decisions were made to commit them. It is currently unknown where Salikov is - he was detained by police at the airport - and whether the International Criminal Court is aware of his appeal.

Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, there have been several cases of military personnel fleeing Russia, declaring their unwillingness to participate in the aggression and their readiness to testify about war crimes. Source: https://censor.net/en/n3462369