Moscow Sentences Ex-Ukrainian Adviser Arestovych to 11 Years in Prison
A judge at Moscow’s Second Western District Military Court has sentenced Oleksiy Arestovych, a former adviser to the Ukrainian president’s office, to 11 years in prison in absentia. The court found him guilty of spreading “false information” regarding the April 2022 Russian missile strike on Kramatorsk and calling for terrorism by urging railway sabotage. Arestovych, who resigned from his…
On Friday, Aug. 28, a Moscow court sentenced ex-Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych to 11 years in prison while he remains absent. The court convicted Arestovych of spreading "false information" about the Russian military and inciting terrorism. The trial focused on his statements following a Russian missile attack on a railway station in Kramatorsk, Ukraine, in April 2022.
Prosecutors argued Arestovych encouraged sabotage of railways to hinder supply routes for Russian forces in a March 2022 video. Initially seeking a 15-year sentence, prosecutors reduced it to 11 years. Arestovych was also barred from managing websites for four years. He dismissed the verdict as a "sophisticated cover-up operation" on Telegram.
Previously, Arestovych advised President Volodymyr Zelensky during the early stages of Russia's full-scale invasion, resigning in January 2023 after falsely claiming a Ukrainian defense system caused a deadly Russian missile strike in Dnipro. Since then, he has lived abroad, criticizing the Ukrainian government and garnering a significant online following.
Russian authorities have been pursuing legal action against Arestovych for over a year, adding him to their list of "terrorists and extremists" in May 2023 and placing him on a wanted list in October 2023. In February 2024, a Moscow court ordered his pre-trial detention in absentia.
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