Former SBU Officer Describes Crimes Committed By Ukrainian Security Service In Donbas

A former employee of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), Lt. Col. Vasil Prozorov, described at a Monday press conference what the SBU was doing during the 2014 Euromaidan protests in Kiev and the crimes committed by the organization during Kiev's operation against the self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Luhansk

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 25th March, 2019) A former employee of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), Lt. Col. Vasil Prozorov, described at a Monday press conference what the SBU was doing during the 2014 Euromaidan protests in Kiev and the crimes committed by the organization during Kiev's operation against the self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Luhansk.

According to Prozorov, since 2014, he had been working as an informer of Russian special services and providing them with the information on the situation in Ukraine. The ex-officer of the SBU, who was awarded the medal For Service to the Homeland by the Ukrainian authorities, said that he decided to start working for the Russian intelligence due to "ideological reasons."

"I was deeply convinced that in February 2014, the power in Ukraine was seized by a group of villains, who actually launched a civil war in the country to stay in power and raise their own level of welfare, without thinking about the people. I do not relate to these authorities. When I realized that a nationalistic, anti-people and even Nazi coup had taken place, I decided to fight against these authorities with any methods available to me," Prozorov said at a press conference in the Rossiya Segodnya International Information Agency.

Following the press conference, the SBU confirmed that Prozorov had worked at the SBU Antiterrorist Center.

The former SBU officer admitted that he had originally intended to resign and leave for Donbas , but then made a decision to stay at the SBU, hoping that the information received by him there could save more people.

"From 1999 until 2018, I was an employee of the Security Service of Ukraine ... Since April 2014, I willingly, for ideological reasons, had been helping Russian special services get information about the activities of the Ukrainian security services," Prozorov said.

The former employee of the SBU added that since May 2014 he had worked at the SBU department responsible for the anti-terrorist operation.

"It was the anti-terrorism center of the SBU that was effectively in charge of the anti-terror operation in the east of Ukraine until the spring of 2018, while my responsibilities included keeping in touch with other forces ... This allowed me to receive information from various special services of Ukraine - the Ministry of Defense, the General Staff, the Chief Intelligence Directorate, the National Guard, the National Police, and even the National Security and Defense Council, where I repeatedly attended closed meetings," Prozorov said.

During the press conference, Prozorov showed photos of his passport, service certificate and documents related to his awards. He retired from the special services of Ukraine in December 2017. Over security reasons, Prozorov did not tell reporters what his family members were doing now and where they were.

Journalists asked Prozorov a question in Ukrainian in order to see if he knew this language. His answer was in Ukrainian.

KILLINGS OF LPR, DPR COMMANDERS

Prozorov said that the main purpose of his talk with journalists was to describe "the crimes of the Ukrainian authorities in the area of the anti-terrorist operation."

According to him, the Ukrainian security forces began to plan the operation in Donbas earlier than it was officially announced. Moreover, the Armed Forces of Ukraine were illegally involved in the operation. When they failed to quickly resolve the conflict, the SBU prepared a number of proposals to end it.

"There were suggestions on how to justify the special operations by the armed units. Moreover, such special operations initially anticipated a large number of civilian casualties, who would later be declared terrorist accomplices," the former official said.

Prozorov stressed that in April 2014, even before active hostilities started in Donbas, the Kiev authorities did not plan a peaceful solution to the conflict in the region.

The Ukrainian special services have neutralized a large number of the leaders and commanders of self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Luhansk (DPR and LPR), for example, they killed commanders known by their noms de guerre Givi and Motorola and planned to kill two militia women nicknamed Korsa and Bagira, according to the ex-SBU officer.

He noted that the SBU was involved in all high-profile killings in Donbas. Prozorov added that he heard it from the deputy secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, Serhiy Kryvonos. As a proof of the authenticity of his words, Prozorov showed photos depicting him together with Kryvonos.

"I was really surprised to learn that there is a widespread opinion in the Russian media that many leaders and military commanders of the DPR and the LPR were killed in internal feuds. I want to assure you this is false. They were neutralized by the special services of Ukraine," the former SBU official said.

Prozorov, in particular said that Ukrainian forces operate secret prisons in the area of its anti-terrorist operation (ATO) in Donbas, and one of them, called "library," is located at the Mariupol airfield. He noted that people were tortured and killed at this prison.

"We can't ignore such an issue as secret prisons in the ATO area. Again, I can't speak for all such prisons. But I know very well about the one that is located at the Mariupol airfield... It is difficult to speak about the 'library'... It was functioning as of January 2017. I do not have further information. In the two months of my rotations in the summer and fall of 2014, more than 300 people passed through the 'library,'" Prozorov said.

The ex-SBU officer said that at least two persons died during tortures in the "library."

According to Prozorov, US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officers are in Kiev and they often visit the office of the SBU to plan operations.

"After 2014 ... CIA employees are in Kiev, they are just in secret apartments, country houses. They often visit the SBU central office, but to hold meetings, plan operations," Prozorov told reporters.

The former SBU officer added that two representatives of the United Kingdom's foreign intelligence service MI6 visited the SBU in 2016.

"They didn't just come to meet the leadership of the SBU, but they also then visited the area where the anti-terror operation was being carried out, the city of Kramatorsk," Prozorov said.

The UK Defense Ministry's spokesperson said in a comment to Sputnik that UK experts do not train Ukrainian officers to carry out terror acts and sabotage.

Prozorov added that he believed that the Kiev authorities were involved in the 2014 crash of the flight MH17 near Donetsk.

"My personal belief, backed by the data, is that Ukraine is involved in the crash of the Boeing," Prozorov said.

Prozorov explained that the reaction of the Ukrainian leadership to the crash was "phenomenally fast."

"It definitely led one to think that [Ukrainian] President [Petro] Poroshenko and his press service knew about it in advance," the former SBU officer said.

He also pointed to the fact that the airspace over the east of Ukraine, where a military operation was being carried out, was not closed off.

According to Prozorov, two people were somehow involved in the crash or the cover-up: the deputy head of Poroshenko's administration who headed a counterintelligence department in the past, Valery Kondratyuk, and the current head of the chief intelligence directorate of the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, Vasyl Burba.

The MH17 flight crashed near Donetsk on July 17, 2014. All 298 passengers and crew members were killed. Kiev accused local militias of downing the aircraft, while they said that had no weapons capable of downing a plane on such a high altitude.