An Italo-Ukrainian, former commander of the Ukrainian National Guard, was acquitted Tuesday, November 3 on appeal by the court in Milan (northern Italy) after being sentenced in 2019 to 24 years in prison for the death of two photographers , including an Italian, report the agencies.
The court made its decision after a six-hour debate and ordered the immediate release of the accused, reports AGI.
Read also: Photographers killed in the war in Ukraine: Kiev defends its fighter
Vitaly Markiv was on trial for the death of Italian photographer Andrea Rocchelli and his Russian colleague Andrey Mironov, killed on May 24, 2014 by mortar fire while in Sloviansk, not far from Donesk, in Donbass (the is a pro-Russian rebel of Ukraine), to cover the bombing of a village.
During this mortar attack, a French photographer, William Roquelon, was seriously injured.
“
I'm happy because he can finally come home.
I always believed that the judges would take the right decision and finally the truth arrived, my son is innocent
”, reacted the mother of the accused, quoted by the agency AGI.
"
We will see what is expected of the verdict and we will decide what to do,
" said the mother of the photographer killed, according to the same source.
Vitaly Markiv was arrested in June 2017 at Bologna airport when he got off a plane arriving from Ukraine and has since been detained in several prisons in Italy.
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