Russia sentences eight defendants in Kerch Bridge bombing case to life imprisonment

Russia’s Southern District Military Court in Rostov-on-Don has sentenced all eight defendants in the Kerch Bridge bombing case to life imprisonment, according to a Mediazona correspondent reporting from the courtroom. They were found guilty of terrorism and transporting explosives in connection with the Oct. 8, 2022 attack on the key transport route connecting mainland Russia to Russian-occupied Crimea.

According to investigators, six business owners, a farmer, and a long-haul truck driver acted in collusion with Ukrainian intelligence services, leading to the detonation of a truck loaded with explosives. The blast caused severe damage to the bridge and killed five people. The defendants pleaded not guilty, insisting they had no knowledge that the cargo contained explosives.

A year after the explosion, Vasyl Malyuk, head of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), detailed in an interview with New Voice how the operation was prepared. He said 21 tons of explosives (in TNT equivalent) were hidden inside metal cylinders placed within large rolls of plastic film. The cargo appeared “entirely civilian.” The operation was planned by three SBU officers, including Malyuk, while the other people involved were “used in the dark [without their knowledge].”

The court found the following defendants guilty and sentenced them to life in prison:

• Roman Solomko, a farmer from Kherson
  
• Artur Terchanyan, an Armenian national and truck driver
  
• Entrepreneur Artem Azatyan
  
• Entrepreneur Georgy Azatyan
  
• Entrepreneur Vladimir Zloba
  
• Entrepreneur Alexander Bylin
  
• Oleg Antipov, head of the logistics company TEK-34
  
• Dmitry Tyazhelykh, who worked with the OnlineSim service
  

In August, the human rights group Memorial recognized all of the defendants as political prisoners. The organization said investigators presented no convincing evidence that the accused knew about the explosives hidden in the shipment or that they intended to blow up the Kerch Bridge:

“In our view, the actions of the defendants before and after the explosion do not show any connection to the Ukrainian intelligence services. On the contrary, after the blast they turned themselves in to the FSB and cooperated with the investigaton.

We believe the case over the Kerch Bridge bombing is clearly political. It is built on the investigators’ assumptions. With the real organizers and perpetrators out of reach for the Russian authorities, the investigators decided to stage a show trial of random people they were able to get their hands on.”

Case files describe in detail the chain of custody for the shipment, and participants — as well as human rights advocates — do not dispute the logistics. However, prosecutors insist the defendants knew the nature of the cargo and intended to destroy the Kerch Bridge. They claim Solomko, the Kherson farmer, developed the route months before the explosion, using it to transport agricultural equipment ordered from China through Russia into occupied Kherson. Investigators say this scheme caught the interest of a Ukrainian citizen, Mykhailo Tsyurkalo — now wanted internationally — who contacted Solomko through an acquaintance, Denis Kovach, saying a shipment of plastic film “had found a buyer.” Solomko, according to his former lawyer, maintains that he merely shared logistical information and did not know explosives were involved.

The film arrived in Poti, Georgia, from Bulgaria, after which driver Artur Terchanyan transported it through Georgia and Armenia into Russia. The truck passed customs three times, as noted by BBC News Russian. In southern Russia, Terchanyan unloaded the shipment at a warehouse belonging to Agrobusiness, owned by Artem and Georgy Azatyan (a route arranged in advance through their acquaintance, Vladimir Zloba, and Solomko). The next morning, the cargo was picked up by Mahir Yusubov, who died in the explosion after accepting the job through a freight-exchange platform. Prosecutors say the listing was posted by TEK-34 head Oleg Antipov of St. Petersburg. Antipov’s contact information was passed to Zloba by entrepreneur Alexander Bylin, whom his family says merely introduced two carriers and had no connection to the content of the cargo.

A separate episode in the indictment concerns 40-year-old Dmitry Tyazhelykh, who worked with the OnlineSim service and maintained GSM gateways in his apartment. Investigators claim one of the virtual phone numbers issued by the system was used for covert communication and tracking of the truck carrying the film. Tyazhelykh has said he did not control how numbers were distributed and only replaced SIM cards in the equipment.

The explosion killed Yusubov, the truck driver hauling the film rolls, as well as four people in a nearby passenger car. The blast triggered a large fire, causing part of the roadway to collapse into the water. Traffic on the bridge was temporarily halted and later opened up in a restricted format while repairs were carried out.