The Kremlin called the pardon of prisoners participating in the war in Ukraine in line with Russian law.
This was stated by the speaker of the President of Russia Dmitry Peskov.
You know that there are decrees open, and there are decrees with different classifications of secrecy. That is why I can’t say anything about decrees, but I can really confirm that the entire procedure for pardoning prisoners is carried out in strict accordance with Russian law,” the Mayak radio station’s telegram channel reports Putin’s company.
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the private military company (PIK) Wagner has begun recruiting prisoners to fight in the war. Yevgeny Prigozhin, chairman of the PIK “Wagner”, promised them a pardon.
In January 2023, Prigozhin announced the removal of all convictions from the first group of former prisoners who participated in the battles in Ukraine as part of the VAT. Dmitry Peskov, commenting on the message about the pardon, said that the pardon is carried out by presidential decree.
Human rights activists said that prisoners participating in the war were pardoned even before they were released from the colonies.
Eva Merkacheva, a member of the Russian Council for Human Rights, told the Russian edition of RIA Novosti about such a pardon procedure. We are talking about the fact that prisoners recruited by the Wagner group for the war in Ukraine receive a pardon before being released from the colonies for departure. In accordance with the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and Art. 89 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, pardon can only be performed by the president.
Merkacheva said that the presidential decree on pardoning convicts who participated in hostilities on the territory of Ukraine contains information that, according to the current legislation of the Russian Federation, is classified as state secret.
The ISW believed that preventive presidential pardons were likely to further recruit the Wagner group in penal colonies and allow fighters to operate with a large degree of impunity in Ukraine.
It is the promise of a legal pardon for criminal activity that likely motivates the convicts to sign contracts with the Wagner Group, knowing that if they survive the operations in Ukraine, they will be released back into Russian society with clean files after being sent, ISW said.
In one of the pardon videos, Prigozhin, the founder of the Wagner PPK, claims that all convictions were removed from the convicts – not only the last, but also earlier ones, and were also awarded Russian state awards – medals “For Courage”.
Among the prisoners shown in this video, the BBC identified repeatedly convicted 34-year-old Anatoly Salmin from the Boksitogorsky district of the Leningrad region.
By 2010, Salmin managed to get several terms of imprisonment, one of which is conditional for leaving the unit or place of service without permission, and the second is real for stealing a car. In 2011, Salmin killed a friend while fishing and received nine years in prison. He was released in 2018, again receiving a parole.
Source: Racurs
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