Based on evidence collected by the Security Service, two enemy agents who committed arson attacks in Cherkasy region have received real prison terms. Both perpetrators were arrested in hot pursuit last autumn.

The organizer of the crimes has been sentenced to 15 years in prison with confiscation of property. His accomplice, who cooperated with the investigation, was sentenced to five years in prison.

The investigation established that the arsonists were acting on orders from russia’s federal security service to destroy administrative buildings, Defense Forces vehicles and energy facilities on Ukrainian railways.

In this way, russian special services hoped to destabilize the socio-political situation in the central region of Ukraine.

One of the enemy accomplices is a 35-year-old drug addict from Zvenyhorod district, whom the FSB recruited on a Telegram channel offering ‘easy money’.

Following the occupiers’ instructions, the agent first set fire to a military off-road vehicle, a transformer substation and a relay cabinet on the railway in the community.

He was then tasked with burning down the local court building.

To do this, he enlisted the help of his 25-year-old acquaintance. Together, they broke the glass of the entrance door of the state institution and set it on fire from the inside.

Based on the evidence collected by the SSU, the court found both accused guilty of crimes under several Articles of the CCU, according to the offences each of them committed:

• 28.2, 113.2 (sabotage, committed by a group, upon prior conspiracy, under martial law);
• 28.2, 114-1.1 (obstruction of the lawful activities of the AFU, during a special period, committed by a group, upon prior conspiracy);
• 28.2, 194-1.2 (intentional damage to electric power facilities, committed by a group, upon prior conspiracy);
• 309.2 (illegal production, manufacture, acquisition, storage, transportation or transfer of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances or their analogues, committed by a group, upon prior conspiracy).

The investigation was carried out by the SSU Office in Cherkasy region under the procedural supervision of the regional Prosecutor’s Office.