In this photo provided by the Press Office of the President of Ukraine, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskiy inspects fortified lines in the Kharkov region of Ukraine, Tuesday, April 9, 2024. (Ukraine Presidential Press Office, via AP)
Russian state media reported on Saturday, citing an Interior Ministry database, that Russia has put Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on the wanted list.
As of Saturday afternoon, Zelenskiy and his predecessor Petro Poroshenko were both on the ministry's wanted list on unspecified criminal charges. General Oleksandr Pavlyuk, commander of the Ukrainian ground forces, was also named on the list.
Russian authorities did not immediately reveal the charges against either man. Russian independent media outlet Mediazona claimed on Saturday that Zelenskyy and Poroshenko had been on the list since at least late February.
In an online statement released on the same day, Ukraine's Ministry of Foreign Affairs rejected reports of Zelensky's participation as evidence of the “desperation of the Russian state apparatus and propaganda.”
Russia's wanted list also includes many officials and members of parliament from Ukraine and NATO countries. Among them is Kaja Kalas, Prime Minister of NATO and EU member Estonia, who has pushed hard for more military aid to Kiev and tougher sanctions against Moscow.
Russian authorities said in February that Kallas was wanted for Tallinn's efforts to remove monuments to Soviet-era Red Army soldiers in the Baltic state, many of whom are accused of past oppression. This is a belated purge of something that is considered a symbol of Japan.
Fellow NATO members Latvia, Lithuania and Poland have also removed monuments widely seen as undesirable legacies of the Soviet occupation of those countries.
Russia has a law that criminalizes the “revival of Nazism,” including punishing the “desecration” of war memorials.
Russia's list includes ministers from Estonia and Lithuania, as well as the International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor who last year issued a warrant against President Vladimir Putin on war crimes charges. The Russian government also indicted Kyrillo Budanov, Ukraine's military intelligence chief, for what it considers “terrorist” activities, including Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian infrastructure.
The Kremlin says Ukraine has a democratically elected Jewish president who lost relatives in the Holocaust, and many Ukrainians want to strengthen the country's democracy, reduce corruption and move it closer to the West. Despite this, he has repeatedly tried to link Ukraine's leaders to Nazism. .
The Russian government has cited Ukraine's “denazification, demilitarization and neutral status” as a key goal of what it calls a “special military operation” against its claimed southern neighbor. The “denazification” claim refers to Russia's false claim that Ukraine's government is heavily influenced by radical nationalist and neo-Nazi groups, a claim that has been ridiculed by Kiev and its Western allies.
The Holocaust, World War II, and Nazism have been important tools for President Putin to justify Russia's war in Ukraine. World War II, in which the Soviet Union lost an estimated 27 million people, is a cornerstone of Russia's national identity, and officials balk at questioning the Soviet Union's role.
Some historians say this is tied to Russia's attempts to reconstruct certain historical truths from the war. They argue that Russia seeks to expand the Soviet Union's role in defeating the Nazis while downplaying the cooperation of Soviet citizens in the persecution of Jews, along with alleged crimes by Red Army soldiers against civilians in Eastern Europe. There is.
