Russian intelligence officer Anatoliy Chepiga, earlier named by UK police as Ruslan Boshirov, a suspect in poisoning of ex-Russian military intelligence officer Sergei Skripal in the UK, may have participated in the evacuation of ex-President Viktor Yanukovych from Ukraine in February 2014.
Serhiy Kaniev, the journalist who took part in the Skripal investigation of Russian The Insider and British Bellingcat, told Ukrainian news outlet Hromadske that Chepiga allegedly headed the operation to evacuate Yanukovych to Russia.
Yanukovych fled Ukraine on Feb. 23, days after a mass shooting of protesters by his security forces and the end of EuroMaidan Revolution. He was first transported to Crimea, and then to the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don.
Chepiga was identified by the British investigative team Bellingcat on Sept. 26. as a highly decorated colonel of the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence service. Bellingcat also said Chepiga had won Russia’s highest state award, the Hero of the Russian Federation medal. Chepiga is one of the two main suspects in the poisoning of ex-intelligence agent Skripal and his daughter Yulia.
“Chepiga took part in Yanukovych’s evacuation to Russia,” Kaniev told Hromadske on Oct. 1. “At least this is what my sources have evidenced. He and his special forces subdivision were at Yanukovych’s residence Mezhyhirya. He was there, he guarded him. From there they transported him to Crimea and then to Russia.”
Kaniev said that the state award was granted to Chepiga for his participation in Yanukovych’s evacuation.
A former security guard of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Alexei Dyumin, also received the same state award for an operation in Crimea, Kaniev said.
Kaniev was reported by Ukrainian media to have fled Russia on Sept. 29.
Yanukovych has been on trial in Obolon district court in absentia since May 2017 on charges of high treason.
