Russian court arrests Ukrainian man accused of espionage

A court in St. Petersburg ruled to continue the detention of the 27-year-old Ukrainian national Ivan Zabavsky, who has been accused of espionage.

Zabavsky was first detained last year while attempting to take his mother away from Russian-occupied territory. Mediazona spoke to his mother, Marina Zabavskaya, about the events leading up to his arrest.

In the past, Zabavsky served in Ukraine’s airborne troops as a conscript. In recent years, he had been living in Kharkiv and working in a café. His mother stayed in the village of Tavilzhanka in the Kharkiv region. After the war began, Russian forces occupied the village. The last time she saw her son was in August 2022.

On 25 September 2022, Marina buried her older sister, who was killed by a shell in her backyard. After that, Marina decided to go to her son in Kharkiv, but was unable to travel through Ukrainian-controlled territory due to ongoing combat. Without informing Ivan, she travelled through Russia and Russian-controlled land, and got in touch with relatives in Ukraine only several days later.

“When I called my relatives, they told me: ‘Vanya went to get you, he wanted to take you away’. We had no internet or cell phone coverage, so there was no way for him to tell me that he was coming to pick me up,” Marina recounted.

She found out later that Ivan, knowing that civilians were not allowed into the war zone, took his friend’s car, loaded it with bread, medicine, and buckwheat, and set out as a volunteer. 

“One neighbour said she saw him and two Russian soldiers go down the road. She says he said hello to her and gave his first and last name. He was taken away towards the centre of the village and she never saw him again,” Marina said.

After that, she was not aware of her son’s whereabouts for many months. Only in May 2023 did the Russian Ministry of Defence finally respond to her enquiry, saying that Ivan Zabavsky was in Russia and had been “detained for opposing the special military operation”. The first official court ruling on his arrest came as late as 22 June. Marina was only informed of this ruling by the Mediazona reporter who spoke to her.