Russian volunteer corps. Who are they?

The Russian Volunteer Corps is a unit that will supposedly fight on the side of Ukraine, its numbers are unknown.

Russia talks about “Ukrainian saboteurs”, Ukraine about a “classic provocation”, and the so-called Russian volunteer corps is responsible. This is how they commented on the incident in the Bryansk region of the Russian Federation, where several men displayed an RGD flag in the video, said they were “not fighting civilians” and called on Russians to “rebell and fight.” What kind of organization is this Russian volunteer corps?

experienced warriors

Russian authorities have never shown evidence of clashes in the so-called “Ukrainian DRG”. But the Russian Volunteer Corps showed another video in which armed men held a flag with the corps emblem in their hands against the background of a post office, while gunshots could be heard off-screen. Apparently, both videos were actually filmed in the village of Lyubechane, Bryansk region, on Kommunisticheskaya Street – there is a feldsher-obstetric station and a post office.

One of the men in the video is Denis Nikitin, 38, who is said to be the leader of this “volunteer corps”. Nikitin was born in Moscow, studied in Europe, and moved to Ukraine in 2017.

Nikitin is the new surname of Denis Kapustin, also known as Denis White Rex.

Previously, Kapustin was a football hooligan, participated in matches for CSKA, lived in Germany. German police called him “one of the most influential” neo-Nazi activists in Germany, he organized MMA tournaments, also called the far-right fighting subculture.

In 2017, Nikitin moved to Ukraine, where he also organized MMA tournaments. The Russian has good relations with representatives of the Azov Regiment – for example, the secretary of the international branch of the regiment, Elena Semenyaka, said that Nikitin helped her establish contacts with the far right from other countries , and in some cases are even represented. Azov interests in international conferences. In 2019, he was banned from entering the EU for 10 years. Der Spiegel wrote that Ukrainian police detained Nikitin on suspicion of drug trafficking, but there was no confirmation of this information.

Stinky volunteers

Nikitin previously said he created the Russian Volunteer Corps from “ethnic Russians,” a unit that was supposed to fight on the side of Ukraine. Its number is unknown, the corps is not recognized as a unit of the Armed Forces of Ukraine

In 2019, a senior German intelligence official told Der Spiegel that Kapustin-Nikitin was “probably closer to Russian power than we can currently prove.” However, other experts interviewed by the publication said that he is unlikely to be linked to the Russian special services, including due to the fact that in recent years he has spent most of his time on the territory of Ukraine.

After the first reports on the events in the Bryansk region, several Russian publications, as well as State Duma representative Andrei Gurulev, reported on an emergency meeting of the Russian Security Council, allegedly held by Vladimir Putin on March 2. If this really took place and it was followed by a quick “sabotage response”, this may indirectly indicate that the Kremlin knew about the attack in advance. But presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the next meeting of the Security Council will be held on March 3, as previously planned.

However, the President of Russia spoke about the incident, calling what happened in the Bryansk region a “terrorist attack.” According to Putin, the “saboteurs” “saw that there was a civilian car there, they saw that there were children sitting there,” but they opened fire anyway.

In this regard, the representative of the Main Intelligence Directorate of Ukraine, Andriy Yusov, called the border clashes “a continuation of Russia’s transformation.”