Alleged Plot Uncovered

Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) Director Leonid Derkach pledges to hold a press conference this week on an alleged plot by residents of Chernihiv, Zaporizhzhia, and Sumy oblasts. Those being held are accused of forming paramilitary groups, learning the deployment of regular military units, discussing ways to steal weapons, and preparing diversionary terrorist actions at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant, Kyiv Reservoir, main natural gas pipelines, and similar dangerous strategic objects. Those being held, reports UNIAN, also allegedly prepared flyers calling for a military uprising and draft documents to be adopted by the new government that they were conspiring to set up. Such actions fall under Article 56.1 of the Criminal Codex, under which the SBU has opened a case in Chernihiv oblast.

SBU representatives state that leaflets, topographic maps, and notations on the organization of an armed uprising were found. However, it must be stated that there has been no evidence of any attempt to distribute such materials. The SBU also declines to disclose how many members the group had or – something that might be of interest to the public — the political sympathies of the alleged plotters, that is, what kind of system they wanted to put in place of the constitutional one. Meanwhile, one of those being detained in an interview on one Ukrainian television outlet denied the allegations. According to him, the organization is only a peaceful association of former Soviet officers averaging sixty years of age. As for the topographic maps with their “mysterious” notations, these were explained away as indicating mushroom patches and were made for the use of those who gather mushrooms.