Igor Girkin
Igor Vsevolodovich Girkin, also known by the alias Igor Ivanovich Strelkov, is a Russian army veteran and former Federal Security Service officer who played a key role in the Russian annexation of Crimea, and then in the Donbas War as an organizer of militant groups in the Donetsk People's Republic. In 2024 he was convicted on charges of inciting extremism. Earlier he received a life sentence in absentia in the Netherlands for his role in downing the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17.
Girkin admitted responsibility for sparking the Donbas War in eastern Ukraine when, in April 2014, he led a group of armed Russian militants who seized Sloviansk. His role in the siege gained him influence and attention, and he was appointed to the position of Minister of Defense in the Donetsk People's Republic, a puppet state of Russia. Girkin was charged with terrorism by Ukrainian authorities. He has also been sanctioned by the European Union, United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Japan, Canada and Switzerland for his leading role in the war in eastern Ukraine.
Girkin was dismissed from his position in August 2014, after 298 civilians were killed when Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down by Russian-backed militants. Dutch prosecutors charged Girkin and three others with mass murder, and issued an international arrest warrant against him. Girkin admitted "moral responsibility" but denied pushing the button. On 17 November 2022, Girkin was found guilty for the murder of 298 people, convicted of all charges in absentia, and issued a life sentence.
Girkin is a self-described Russian nationalist. After his service in the war, he returned to Russia in 2014 as a political activist, reportedly calling for the liberal part of the Russian elite to be destroyed, which would shift the power balance in favor of militarists and securocrats.
During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Girkin regained attention as a milblogger, taking a strong pro-war stance but criticizing the Russian military for what he saw as incompetence and "insufficiency". In October 2022, Girkin briefly joined a volunteer unit fighting against Ukrainian forces. In April 2023, Girkin, alongside some fellow Russian nationalists joined the Club of Angry Patriots, a hardline pro-war group. He began criticizing Vladimir Putin for incompetence and on 21 July 2023 was arrested by Russian authorities on charges of extremism. Girkin was convicted in January 2024 of inciting extremism and sentenced to four years' imprisonment.
Early life
Girkin was born in Moscow, Russia, on 17 December 1970.According to The New York Times, "his ideological rigidity precedes any connections he has to Russia's security services, stretching back at least to his days at the Moscow State Institute for History and Archives. There, Girkin obsessed over military history and joined a small but vocal group of students who advocated a return to monarchism."
Vice News reported that "during the 1990s, Girkin wrote for the right-wing Russian newspaper Zavtra, which is run by the anti-Semitic Russian nationalist Alexander Prokhanov" and where Alexander Borodai was an editor. Writing for Zavtra, Girkin and Borodai, who too was reported to have fought for Russia-backed Transnistria and Republika Srpska separatists in Moldova and Bosnia and Herzegovina, together covered the Russian war against separatists in Chechnya and Dagestan.
He would also often write as a "Colonel in the Reserves" on Middle East subjects, such as the conflicts in Libya, Egypt and Syria, and for the Abkhazian Network News Agency, a Russian-language pro-Russian publication which supports Abkhazian separatism in Georgia.
FSB service (1996–2003)
The Russian media has identified Girkin as an officer of the Russian military reserves who has expressed hardline views on eliminating perceived enemies of the Russian state. He has fought on the federal side in Russian counter-separatist campaigns in Chechnya and on the pro-Moscow separatist side in the conflict in Moldova's breakaway region of Transnistria.In 1999, he published his memoirs of the fighting in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 2014, he was accused by Bosnian media and a retired Bosnian Army officer of having been involved in the Višegrad massacres in which thousands of civilians were killed in 1992.
The BBC reported Girkin may have worked for Russia's Federal Security Service in a counter-terrorism unit, citing Russian military experts. According to Russian media, he has served as an FSB officer and his last role before retirement was reportedly with the FSB's Directorate for Combating International Terrorism.
In 2014 Anonymous International disclosed what it said were Girkin's personal emails, revealing that he had served in the FSB for 18 years from 1996 to March 2013, including in Chechnya from 1999 to 2005, The Moscow Times reported. The newspaper also said Girkin was born in Moscow and that it contacted him by email and phone but that he would not confirm the claims. A local pro-Russia militia leader in Ukraine, Vyacheslav Ponomarev, a self-described old friend of Girkin's, said the information about Girkin was true. His pseudonym "Strelkov" can be roughly translated as "Rifleman" or "Shooter". He has also been dubbed Igor Groznyy.
Chechen Wars
Alexander Cherkasov, head of Russia's leading human rights group Memorial, is convinced that the "Igor Strelkov" involved in Ukraine is the same person as a Russian military officer called "Strelkov", who was identified as being directly responsible for at least six instances of the forced disappearance and presumed murder of residents of Chechnya's mountain Vedensky District village of Khatuni and nearby settlements of Makhkety and Tevzeni in 20012002, when "Strelkov" was attached to the 45th Detached Reconnaissance Regiment special forces unit of the Russian Airborne Troops based near Khatuni.None of these crimes were solved by official investigations. The website of Chechnya's official human rights ombudsman lists several residents of Khatuni who went missing in 2001 as having been kidnapped from their homes and taken to the 45th DRR base by the officers known as "Colonel Proskuryn and Strelkov Igor". Another entry lists the missing person Beslan Taramov as abducted in 2001 in the village of Elistandzhi by the 45th DRR servicemen led by "Igor Strelko ".
Cherkasov also lists Durtayev and Tashayev among the alleged victims of "Strelkov". Cherkasov and other observers suspected it was in fact the same "Strelkov" until May 2014, when Girkin himself confirmed he has been present at Khatuni in 2001, where he fought against the "local population".
According to Cherkasov, as a result of Girkin's actions in Chechnya, two sisters of one of those "disappeared", Uvais Nagayev, in effect turned to terrorism and died three years later: one of these sisters, Aminat Nagayeva, blew herself up in the 2004 Russian aircraft bombings over Tula Oblast aboard a Tu-134 "Volga-Aeroexpress" airliner, killing 43. The other sister, Rosa Nagayeva, participated in the Beslan hostage crisis that same year.
The emails leaked in May 2014 and allegedly authored by Girkin contain his diaries from Bosnia and Chechnya that he sent to his friends for review. One story describes an operation of capturing Chechen activists from a village of Mesker-Yurt. Asked by one of friends why he didn't publish them, Girkin explained that "people we captured and questioned almost always disappeared without trace, without court, after we were done" and this is why these stories cannot be openly published.
Annexation of Crimea and Donbas War (2014)
Following the February 2014 Ukrainian revolution, there were pro-Russian, counter-revolutionary demonstrations in southeastern Ukraine.Crimea
After 16 years with the FSB, Girkin found employment as head of security for Russian businessman Konstantin Malofeev, nicknamed the “the Orthodox oligarch” for his close ties to the Russian Orthodox Church and the Kremlin. In January 2014, Girkin traveled to Kiev, where he was responsible for the security of a tour of religious relics to the Kiev Cave Monastery. The relics were part of the Gifts of the Magi and were exhibited in Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine. During his stay, he visited the Euromaidan and, after talking to local people, became convinced that the protests would be successful and that Ukraine would fall apart in the near future.The relic tour moved on to Crimea at the end of January, where Malofeev met with the speaker of the Crimean parliament, Vladimir Konstantinov, and discussed with him whether he would be prepared to take “more drastic action” in asserting Crimea’s autonomy should Kyiv descend into complete mayhem. After further meetings between Malofeev and local politicians Sergei Aksyonov and Rustam Temirgaliev, Malofeev and Girkin returned to Moscow. In the first half of February, the Kremlin received a strategy paper that was published a year later by the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta. The paper stated that the government of President Viktor Yanukovych was “totally bankrupt” and without any future. The report proposed supporting separatist movements in southeastern Ukraine, focusing on Crimea and the Kharkiv region. The Kremlin and Malofeev denied any connection to this paper.
On Malofeev's recommendation, Girkin was invited back to Crimea at the end of February by Sergei Aksyonov, a member of the Parliament of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and later Prime Minister of Crimea, to serve as his “security advisor,” who put him in charge of his militias. The official commander of the militias was Aksyonov's close associate Mikhail Sheremet, but Girkin was responsible for the operational control of some units and their coordination with Russian security forces. According to reports, he introduced himself to local militiamen as an “emissary of the Kremlin”.
On the morning of February 27, militias occupied the Building of the Supreme Council of Crimea in Simferopol. Girkin ordered the militias to round up local lawmakers and forced them to call an extraordinary session in which they voted for Sergei Aksyonov as the new local prime minister. He founded the political party Russian Unity that received just 4 per cent of the votes in the last elections. Girkin’s men forced a vote for a referendum on the separation of Crimea from Ukraine on 25 May. Girkin admitted more than a year later on Russian television, that most of the peninsula’s government officials were against the move. “I did not see any support from the authorities in Simferopol where I was,” he confessed. “It was militants who collected deputies and forced them to vote. Yes, I was one of the commanders of those militants.” He was also reported to be instrumental in negotiating the 2014 defection of the Ukrainian Navy commander Denis Berezovsky.
Girkin's unit was also involved in the 2014 Simferopol incident, the only direct violent confrontation with the Ukrainian military. The incident took place on March 18 at the Cartography Center in Simferopol and resulted in the death of a Ukrainian soldier. According to another report, two people were killed in this incident. Girkin was later accused by the Crimean authorities of negligence for his role in the violent storming of the base. This led to the disarmament and disbandment of Girkin's unit.