Russian intelligence calls for the arrest of two Ukrainian ministers

The Kremlin attacks Ukrainian diplomacy.

Russian intelligence (FSB, ex-KGB) has called for the arrest of two Ukrainian ministers, a Moscow court said on Tuesday.

The two officials are accused, according to Russian media, of having violated the territorial integrity of Russia by traveling to annexed Ukrainian territories in September.

“FSB investigators asked (…) to order in absentia the arrest of the Minister for the Reintegration of Territories not under the control of Ukraine, Irina Vereshchuk, and the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Emine Djaparova, said the Lefortovo court in Moscow.

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The court would not specify the reason given by the Russian security services, but according to the state news agency Tass, the two ministers are accused of violating the territorial integrity of Russia.

Ukrainian officials, despite the fighting, are moving across Ukraine, including the four regions that Moscow illegally annexed in late September.

A symbolic judgment

Irina Vereshchuk, for example, recently visited Kherson, capital of the eponymous southern region that Ukrainian forces took over in November, inflicting a new setback on Russia.

On the other hand, we do not know where Emine Djaparova went but, as a Crimean Tatar, the latter regularly promotes the end of the Russian occupation of this Ukrainian peninsula.

This request for arrest in absentia from the Moscow court has above all a symbolic dimension because Emine Djaparova and Irina Vereshchuk would have to go, or be forcibly taken, to Russian territory to be tried.

Moscow annexed the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea in 2014, then claimed in September 2022 the annexation of four other regions of Ukraine that it does not fully control.

The international community has overwhelmingly rejected Russian claims and denounced its offensive against Ukraine.

Even states that had remained ambiguous with Moscow since February called for respect for Ukrainian territorial integrity.