On July 4, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) established the identity of a GRU employee of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia, Valery Travkin, who is involved in supplying weapons to gangs and mercenaries in eastern Ukraine, as per the SBU’s press service.
Together with his collaborator known as “Hrek” [the Greek], he organized a supply of heavy weaponry from Russia’s Rostov Oblast, using the so-called “corridors” in the Ukrainian-Russian border. The had experience fighting in Chechnya, and because of that was preparing militants for supplementing terrorist organizations in Luhansk Oblast.
He was also one of the organizers of the coordination meeting of the leaders of the separatist so-called “Donetsk and Luhansk People’s republics,” which was held June 24 in Rostov-on-Don with the participation of special services and Russian officials. At this meeting, the Russian side had called for a complete subordination of terrorists, militias, and mercenaries operating in eastern Ukraine to Russia’s Ministry of Defense.
Translated by Alya Shandra
