A man was sentenced to 12 years in prison by a Russian court in the occupied peninsula of Crimea on Thursday for recording Russian military positions to assist Ukraine’s armed forces, Russian news outlets reported.
Since sending soldiers into Ukraine, Moscow has targeted hundreds of its own people who it claims have helped or backed Kyiv during the two-year conflict.
Crimea’s top court ruled that a man born in 1991 and a resident of the Saky district was “guilty of high treason,” according to Russian official news outlets citing the court’s press service.
Prosecutors stated the guy “made videos of the process of work of an air defence system and commented on its location with the goal of assisting Ukraine’s armed forces,” according to RIA Novosti.
They claim he then forwarded the clip to a Ukrainian chatbot designed to gather intelligence on Russian military targets.
Russia opened a record number of treason cases in 2023, according to independent rights groups, after tightening rules and boosting fines during its push against Ukraine.
Ukraine has severely targeted Crimea, which Moscow took from Kyiv in 2014, unleashing repeated missile and drone strikes on the peninsula since Russia launched its full-fledged military invasion in February 2022.