The Kherson City Court handed down a verdict to a resident of the Kherson region, Viktor Ostapiuk, who distributed propaganda newspapers during the occupation.
The verdict was published on the website of the Unified State Register of Court Decisions.
As the investigation found and the court confirmed, in the summer of 2022 the man received printed issues of the newspaper “Naddnepryanskaya Pravda” from representatives of the occupying authorities and distributed them in the village of Chornobaivka.
“The texts of which contain statements denying the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, begun in 2014 and in February 2022, justification, recognition as lawful of the temporary occupation of part of Ukraine’s territory, expressed in the form of factual assertions and evaluative (assessment) judgments”, – says the court document.
After the de-occupation of the right bank of the Kherson region the man was detained, and in October this year he reached an agreement with the prosecutor to plead guilty.
At the trial the man expressed remorse and assisted in uncovering the offense, the court ruling says.
On December 8 the court approved the agreement and found the man guilty of justifying the Russian Federation’s aggression against Ukraine (part 2 of Article 436-2 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).
He was sentenced to 3 years of imprisonment without confiscation of property, but was exempted from serving the sentence, with a probationary period of 1 year established.