Ukraine’s security service charges Russian colonel for deadly strike on Kryvyi Rih

The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) has charged Russian Colonel Oleg Skitsky in absentia for commanding a missile strike on civilian targets in Kryvyi Rih.

According to the SBU, Skitsky directly oversaw the Russian airstrike on private company warehouses in Kryvyi Rih in the early summer of 2023, which killed seven civilian workers and one local resident.

Currently serving as the commander of the 121st Heavy Bomber Aviation Regiment of the Russian Aerospace Forces, Skitsky allegedly ordered the deployment of several Tu-95 strategic bombers to carry out the assault. The missile, identified as an air-to-ground Kh-101, was launched from over the Caspian Sea and struck a commercial facility in the city.

The SBU has documented additional crimes linked to Skitsky, who is accused of coordinating missile and bomb strikes on Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure. Based on the gathered evidence, he has been charged under Part 2, Article 438 of Ukraine’s Criminal Code – war crimes resulting in the deaths of people.

Investigations, led by the SBU in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast with the regional prosecutor’s office, are ongoing to hold Skitsky accountable.

In the summer of 2024, the SBU also linked Skitsky to strikes on power plants and substations in Kyiv, Zhytomyr, Kirovohrad, and Vinnytsia oblasts, leading to separate charges filed against him.

Earlier, the SBU charged the head of the Russian Armed Forces’ Radiation, Chemical, and Biological Defense Troops, Igor Kirillov, in absentia. According to Ukrainian authorities, more than 4,800 cases of Russian chemical munitions use had been recorded under Kirillov’s orders since February 2022, particularly involving CS and CN riot control agents.

The next day, Kirillov was killed by a bomb hidden in a scooter outside his apartment building in Moscow.

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