Igor Korchinsky. Screenshot: Russia’s Prosecutor General’s Office
A man accused of planning to assassinate the Russian-installed head of annexed Crimea has been sentenced to 18 years in prison, Russia’s Prosecutor General’s Office announced on Tuesday.
Igor Korchinsky, 35, originally from the Russian-occupied city of Melitopol in Ukraine’s southeastern Zaporizhzhia region, planned to blow up the car of Russian-installed Crimea head Sergey Aksyonov “under the guidance of a Ukrainian security service officer”, the Prosecutor’s Office said.
The officer taught Korchinsky surveillance techniques and how to use explosives in the city of Zaporizhzhia between December 2022 and April 2023, the court said, before Korchinsky allegedly travelled to Crimea to track Aksyonov’s movements and collect an explosive device to attach to his car.
A military court in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don found Korchinsky guilty of undergoing training and preparing to commit a terrorist attack, as well as illegal possession of weapons.
In July 2023, Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) announced it had arrested a Russian citizen it said had been planning an attempt on Aksyonov’s life on the orders of a Ukrainian intelligence agent. The Prosecutor General’s Office did not specify whether Korchinsky had pleaded guilty to the charges against him.
Aksyonov has served as the head of Crimea since February 2014, when he was installed as its prime minister amid the presence of pro-Russian gunmen in its parliament building in Simferopol, shortly before Vladimir Putin formally annexed the peninsula.
In May, Aksyonov said that four attempts on his life had been thwarted since the start of the year, adding in July that at least 10 people were awaiting sentencing for their involvement in assassination plots.
