Lawyer: Sentsov and Kolchenko will be able to return to Ukraine only as a result of an exchange

Director Oleg Sentsov and activist Oleksandr Kolchenko will be able to return to Ukraine only as part of the exchange procedure, Kolchenko's lawyer Svetlana Sidorkina believes. The defender made such a conclusion after the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs supported the refusal to extradite the convicts to Ukraine.

“If an exchange is possible, then it can most likely follow the same pattern as the exchange of [Gennady] Afanasyev and [Yuri] Soloshenko,” the lawyer said in a conversation with Novaya Gazeta.

Recall that Russian President Vladimir Putin said that for the release of Sentsov, certain conditions must “ripen”. One of these conditions, the lawyer believes, may be the resonance around the case on international platforms, including thanks to which Nadezhda Savchenko was returned to Ukraine.

Earlier on Monday, Deputy Minister of Justice of Ukraine for European Integration Serhiy Petukhov said that Russia had repeatedly refused to hand over the convicted Sentsov and Kolchenko to Ukraine. In support of his words, Petukhov published several pages of the document, which are the response of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

The text states that Sentsov and Kolchenko are Russian citizens and therefore cannot be extradited.

“Since there is no international agreement between the Russian Federation and Ukraine regulating issues of dual citizenship, and also due to the fact that Kolchenko A.A. and Sentsov O.G. are Russian citizens, the Russian side sees no reason to transfer them to Ukraine for further serving their sentences,” the document says.

Petukhov promised that Ukraine would continue to seek the return of both convicts to the country, both through international organizations and through lawsuits to the European Court of Human Rights.

At the end of October, the Russian Ministry of Justice also refused to transfer Oleg Sentsov, convicted in the so-called “Crimean terrorists” case, to Ukraine.

In Russia, Oleg Sentsov was sentenced to 20 years in a strict regime colony. Alexander Kolchenko was sentenced to ten years. Both of them called the case against themselves fabricated.