I
will post information about the Russian Nationalist Commander, Igor Girkin from
Wikipedia and other news sources links.
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Igor Girkin
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| Igor Girkin |
Nickname(s)
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"Strelkov"
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Born
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17 December 1970
Moscow, Soviet Union |
Allegiance
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Russia
Transnistria
Republika Srpska
Donetsk
People's Republic
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Service/branch
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Federal Security Service
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Years of service
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1992 – March 2013
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Rank
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FSB Colonel
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Battles/wars
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Other work
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Donetsk People's Republic Defense Minister (16 May – 14
August 2014)
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Igor Vsevolodovich Girkin (Russian: Игорь
Всеволодович Гиркин,
Ukrainian: І́гор Все́володович Гі́ркін), also known as Igor Ivanovich Strelkov (Russian:
Игорь Иванович Стрелков),
born on 17 December 1970, is a Russian citizen from Moscow who played a key
role in the War in Donbass as an organizer of Donetsk People's Republic
insurgency. Strelkov, a Russian nationalist and veteran of several other
conflicts, was charged by Ukraine authorities with terrorism and is currently
sanctioned by the European Union for his leading role in the insurgency in
eastern Ukraine. By his own admission, he served in the Russian FSB until March
2013. Ukrainian and EU authorities have identified him as a retired colonel of
the GRU (Russia's external military intelligence organisation) who participated
in the 2014 Crimea crisis.
According
to different sources, he unreservedly demands that the "liberal
clans" (liberal part of the Russian elite) be destroyed.
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Strelkov dressed
as a White Guard of the Russian Civil War (specnaz.ru)
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Biography
Involvement
in earlier conflicts
The
Russian media has identified Igor Strelkov as an officer of the Russian
military reserves who has expressed hardline views on eliminating perceived
enemies of the Russian state and has fought on the federal side in Russian
counter-separatist campaigns in Chechnya and on the
pro-Moscow separatist side in the conflict in Moldova's breakaway region of Transnistria. According to various sources,
Strelkov took part in the Bosnian War as a
volunteer on Serb side, and in Chechnya under contract.[note 1] In 1999, he published his
memoirs of the fighting in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 2014, he was accused by
Bosnian media (Klix) and a retired Bosnian
Army officer of having been involved in Višegrad massacres
in which thousands of civilians were killed in 1992.
The
BBC
reported Strelkov may have worked for Russia's Federal
Security Service (FSB) in a counter-terrorism unit, citing Russian
military experts. According to Russian media, he has served as an FSB officer
and his last role before retirement was reportedly with the FSB's Directorate
for Combating International Terrorism.
In
2014 Anonymous International disclosed what it said were Strelkov's personal
emails, revealing that he had served in the FSB for 18 years from 1996 to March
2013, including in Chechnya from 1999 to 2005, The Moscow Times reported. The
newspaper also said Girkin was born in Moscow and that it contacted him by
email and phone but that he would not confirm the claims. A local pro-Russia
militia leader in Ukraine, Vyacheslav
Ponomarev, a self-described old friend of Girkin's, said the
information about Girkin was true. His pseudonym "Strelkov"
("Strelok") can be roughly translated as "Rifleman" or
"Shooter". He has also been dubbed Igor Grozny ("Igor the
Terrible").
Alexander
Cherkasov, head of Russia's leading human rights group Memorial,
is convinced that the "Igor Strelkov" of Ukraine is the same person
as a Russian military officer called "Strelkov", who was identified
as being directly responsible for at least six instances (on four separate
occasions) of the forced
disappearance and presumed murder of residents of Chechnya's
mountain Vedensky District
village of Khatuni and nearby settlements of Makhkety and Tevzeni in 2001–2002,
when "Strelkov" was attached to the 45th
Detached Reconnaissance Regiment special forces unit of the Russian Airborne
Troops based near Khatuni. None of these crimes were solved by
official investigations. Website of Chechnya's official human rights ombudsman
in fact lists at least two residents of Khatuni who went missing in 2001
(Beslan Durtayev and Supyan Tashayev) as having been kidnapped from their homes
and taken to the 45th DRR base by the officers known as "Colonel Proskuryn
and Strelkov Igor"; another entry lists the missing person Beslan Taramov
as abducted in 2001 in the village of Elistandzhi by the 45th DRR servicemen
led by "Igor Strelko (nicknamed Strikal)". Cherkasov too lists
Durtayev and Tashayev (but not Taramov) among the alleged victims of
"Strelkov". Cherkasov and other observers suspected it was in fact
the same "Strelkov" until May 2014, when Igor Strelkov / Girkin
himself confirmed he has been present at Khatuni in 2001, where he fought
against the "local population". According to Cherkasov, as a result
of Strelkov's actions in Chechnya, two sisters of one of those
"disappeared", Uvais Nagayev,[note 2] in effect turned to
terrorism and died three years later: one of these sisters, Aminat Nagayeva,
blew herself up in the 2004
Russian aircraft bombings over the Tula Oblast aboard a Tu-134 "Volga-Aeroexpress"
airliner, killing 43; the other sister, Rosa Nagayeva, participated in the Beslan hostage
crisis that same year.
The
emails leaked in May 2014 and allegedly authored by Strelkov contain his
diaries from Bosnia and Chechnya he sent to his friends for review. One story
describes an operation of capturing Chechen activists from a village of
Mesker-Yurt. Asked by one of friends why he doesn't publish them, Strelkov
explain that "people we captured and questioned almost slways disappeared
without trace, without court, after we were done" and this is why these
stories cannot be openly published.
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Bezler (left), Kozitsyn and Strelkov
reportedly discussed the downing. Photos: Reuters, SCMP Pictures
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Involvement
in the Ukrainian conflict
See
also: Siege of Sloviansk and War
in Donbass
On
12 April 2014, Girkin led a group of militants who seized the executive
committee building, the police department, and the Security Service of Ukraine offices in Sloviansk.
His militia was formed in Crimea and consisted of volunteers from Russia, Crimea, but also
from other regions of Ukraine (Vinnitsa, Zhitomir, Kiev) and many people from
Donetsk and the Lugansk region. Two thirds were Ukrainian citizens. The
majority of men in the unit had combat experience. Many of those with Ukrainian
citizenship have fought in the Russian Armed Forces in Chechnya and Central
Asia. Others fought in Irak and Yugoslavia with the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
The
SBU presented Strelkov's presence in Donbass as proof
of Russia's involvement in the East Ukraine crisis and released intercepted
telephone conversations between "Strelkov" and his supposed handlers
in Moscow. Russia denied any interference in Ukraine by its troops outside
Crimea. In July, Ukrainian authorities alleged Russian Defense Minister Sergei
Shoygu has coordinated all of Girkin's actions, supplying him and
"other terrorist leaders" with "the most destructive
weapons" since May and instructing him directly, with Russian President Vladimir
Putin's approval.
On
15 April, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU)
opened a criminal proceeding against "Igor Strelkov". He was
described as a Russian recruiter and leader of armed "saboteurs" and
a chief organizer of the "terror" in Ukraine's Sloviansk
Raion (including an ambush that killed one and wounded three SBU officers),
who had previously coordinated Russian military takeovers of Ukrainian units in
Crimea during
the 2014 Crimea crisis in March, after having
crossed the Russian-Ukrainian border in Simferopol
on February 26. In Crimea, he was reported to be instrumental in negotiating
the defection of the Ukrainian Navy commander Denis
Berezovsky. The next day (April 16), he allegedly sought to recruit
Ukrainian soldiers captured at the entrance to Kramatorsk.
Ukrainian
government claims Strelkov was behind the 17 April kidnapping, torture and
murder of a local Ukrainian politician Volodymyr Rybak and a 19-year-old college
student Yury Popravko. Rybak's abduction by a group of men in Horlivka was
recorded on camera. The SBU released portions of intercepted calls in which
another Russian citizen, alleged GRU officer and Girkin's subordinate Igor Bezler
orders Rybak to be "neutralized", and a subsequent conversation in
which "Strelkov" is heard instructing Ponomarev to dispose of
Rybak's body, which is "lying here [in the basement of the separatist
headquarters in Sloviansk] and beginning to smell." Rybak's corpse with a
smashed head, multiple stab wounds and ripped stomach was found later in April
in a river near Sloviansk; Popravko's body was also found nearby. Ukrainian
Interior Minister Arsen Avakov described Girkin as "a
monster and a killer" and the incident helped to prompt the government's
"anti-terrorist" military offensive against the pro-Russia
separatists in Ukraine.
During
the weekend of 26–27 April, the political leader of the separatist Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and
Girkin's long-time friend, Alexander
Borodai, also a Russian national from Moscow, ceded control of all
separatist fighters in the entire Donetsk region to him. On 26 April,
"Strelkov" made his first public appearance when he gave a video
interview to Komsomolskaya Pravda where he confirmed
that his militia in Sloviansk came from Crimea. He said nothing about his own
background, denied receiving weapons or ammunition from Russia, and announced
that his militia would not release the Organisation for
Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) observers that it had taken
hostage unless pro-Russia activists were first freed by the Ukrainian
government. On 28 April, the EU sanctioned "Igor Strelkov" as a GRU
staff member believed to be a coordinator of armed actions and a security
assistant to Crimea's Sergey Aksyonov. On 29 April, Girkin appointed a
new police chief for Kramatorsk. On May 12, "I. Strelkov" declared
himself "the Supreme Commander of the DPR" and all of its
"military units, security, police, customs, border guards, prosecutors,
and other paramilitary structures."
According
to a report issued by the Office
of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, "reportedly,
on 26 May, by order of Igor Strelkov, Dmytro Slavov ('commander of a company of
the people's militia') and Mykola Lukyanov ('commander of a platoon of the
militia of Donetsk People's Republic') were 'executed' in Slovyansk, after they
were 'sentenced' for 'looting, armed robbery, kidnapping and abandoning the
battle field'. The order, which was circulated widely and posted in the streets
in Slovyansk, referred to a decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the
USSR of 22 June 1941 as the basis for the execution." The report also
mentions Strelkov's efforts to recruit local women into his armed formations:
"A particular call for women to join the armed groups was made on 17 May
through a video released with Igor Girkin 'Strelkov', urging women of the
Donetsk region to enlist in combat units." Sloviansk's separatist
"people's mayor" and former boss of Girkin, Ponomarev, was himself
detained on an order of "Strelkov" on 10 June for "engaging in
activities incompatible with the goals and tasks of the civil
administration".
On
the night of 4–5 July, during a large-scale offensive by the Ukrainian military
following the end of a 10-day ceasefire on 30 June, Girkin and his militants
fled from Sloviansk, which was then captured by Ukrainian forces, thus ending
the separatist occupation of the city which had started on 6 April. Shortly
before this, a video was posted on YouTube in which
Girkin desperately pleaded for military aid from Russia for "Novorossiya"
("New Russia", a separatist name for eastern Ukraine) and said
Sloviansk "will fall earlier than the rest." Other rebel leaders
denied Girkin's assessment that the insurgents were on the verge of collapse.
One of them, the self-proclaimed "people's governor" of Donetsk Pavel
Gubarev, compared Girkin to the 19th century Russian general Mikhail
Kutuzov, claiming that both "Strelkov" and Kutuzov would
"depart only before a decisive, victorious battle." However, his
retreat was strongly criticized by the Russian nationalist Sergey
Kurginyan and a rumor inside Russian ultranationalist circles alleged
Russia's powerful "grey cardinal" figure Vladislav
Surkov conspired with east Ukrainian oligarch Rinat
Akhmetov to organize a campaign against "Strelkov" as well as
against the Eurasianism ideologue Alexander
Dugin. Kurginyan accused Strelkov of surrendering Sloviansk and
not keeping his oath to die in Sloviansk. Kurginyan believes that surrendering
Sloviansk is a war crime, and Strelkov should be responsible for that. Donetsk
People's Republic security minister Alexander Khodakovsky, the SBU Alfa
defector and commander of the rebel Vostok Battalion, also protested and
threatened a mutiny.
In
social networks Girkin claimed that "Junta forces" drive their newly
mobilized Ukrainian soldiers into the ground with bulldozers, National Guard of
Ukraine shoots at peaceful citizens and own "punishers" and the
"punishers" with use of artillery and MRLs succeeded in destroying
the local potato harvest.
On
10 July 2014, news outlet Mashable reported finding execution orders three days
previously for Slavov and Lukyanov in Girkin's abandoned Sloviansk
headquarters. The orders were signed "Strelkov" with the name Girkin
Igor Vsevolodovich printed underneath. Also sentenced to death was Alexei
Pichko, a civilian who was caught stealing two shirts and a pair of pants from
an abandoned house of his neighbour; according to an unconfirmed story, his
body "had been dumped on the front lines" after he was executed. On
July 24, Ukrainian authorities exhumed several corpses from a mass grave site
on the grounds of a children’s hospital near the Jewish cemetery in Slovyansk,
which might contain as many as 20 bodies of those executed by order of
"Strelkov". Among the identified victims were four Ukrainian Protestants who the police and
locals said have been kidnapped on June 8 after attending a service at their
church, falsely accused of helping the Ukrainian Army, robbed for their cars,
and shot the following day.
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Multiple
sources cited a post on the VKontakte social networking service that was made by an
account under Girkin's name which acknowledged shooting down an aircraft at
approximately the same time that the civilian arliner Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 (MH17) was
reported to have crashed in eastern Ukraine in the same area near the Russian
border on July 17, 2014. The post specifically referenced how warnings were
issued for planes not to fly in their airspace and the downing of a Ukrainian
military Antonov An-26 transport plane which the Ukraine
Crisis Media Center suggested was a case of misidentification with the MH17.
This post was deleted later in the day and the account behind it claimed that
Igor Girkin has no official account on this social service. Most of the 298
victims in the plane's crash came from the Netherlands; the country's biggest
newspaper De Telegraaf included Girkin's photo in the front
page collage of pro-Russian rebel leaders under the one-word headline
"Murderers" ("Moordenaars"). Russian opposition lawyer and
politician Mark Feygin posted a purported order by Girkin where he
instructs all his men and commanders who "have in their possession
personal effects from this plane" to deliver the found items to his HQ so
"the valuables (watches, earrings, pendants, and other jewelry and items
from valuable metals)" would be transferred to "the Defense Fund of
the DPR." Girkin was reported to the author of an alternative version of
the incident, wherein "no living people were aboard the plane as it flew
on autopilot
from Amsterdam,
where it had been pre-loaded with 'rotting corpses'." This conspiracy
theory was then distributed and discussed in all of Russia state-controlled
media outlets.
At
his press-conference on July 28, 2014, Girkin denied his connection to the
downed plane and announced that his militants were killing
"black-skinned" mercenaries.
According
to ITAR-TASS news agency on Wednesday, August 13, 2014, Igor Girkin was
seriously wounded the previous day in fierce fighting in the pro-Russian rebel
held territories of Eastern Ukraine, and was described to be in
"grave" condition. DNS representative Sergei Kavtaradze refuted this
news this shortly after, saying Strelkov is "alive and well".
On
August 14 leadership of DNR announced that Strelkov was dismissed from his
position of defense minister "on his own request" as he was assigned
"some other tasks". On August 16 the Russian TV-Zvezda claimed that
Strelkov was "on vacation" and was appointed a as military chief of
combined forces of Lugansk and Donetsk (he previously was in command of Donetsk
forces only) and after he returns he will be put to a task of creating an
unified command over forces of Federal State of Novorossiya.
On
August 22 a former insurgent Anton Raevsky ("Nemetz") said in an
interview in Rostov-on-Don that Strelkov and his supporters are
being cleansed from DNR by FSB because of this insufficient compliance with
Kremlin's policy on the republic.
On
August 28 Russian media published photos of Girkin walking with Alexander
Dugin and Konstantin Malofeev in Valaam
Monastery in northern Russia.
In
November 2014 in an interview for "Moscow Speaking" radio said that
"the existence of Lugansk and Donetsk People's Republics in their current
form, with the low-profile but still bloody war, is definitely convenient for
USA in the first place, and only for them, because they are the ulcer that
divides Russia and Ukraine". Later in November in an interview for
"Zavtra" newspaper Girkin stated that the war in Donbass was launched
by his detachment despite both Ukrainian government and local combatants
avoided an armed confrontation before. Also he recognized himself responsible
for actual situation in Donetsk and other cities of the region.
Other
activities
In
late April 2014, Strelkov was identified by Ukrainian intelligence as Colonel Igor
Girkin, registered as a resident of Moscow. Journalists visiting the apartment
where he allegedly lived with his mother, sister, as well as his former wife and
two sons, were told by neighbors that a "fancy black car" had that
same morning picked up the woman living there. The neighbors also described him
as "polite" and quiet, and knew him under two surnames, Girkin and
Strelkov. Girkin is known as a fan of military-historical movement and has
participated in several reenactments connected with various periods of Russian
and international history, but especially the Russian
Civil War where he would play a White
movement officer. His personal idol and role model is said to be the White
Guard general Mikhail Drozdovsky, killed in a battle with the Red Army in
1919. According to The New York Times, "his ideological
rigidity precedes any connections he has to Russia’s security services,
stretching back at least to his days at the Moscow State Institute for
History and Archives. There, Mr. Strelkov obsessed over military history
and joined a small but vocal group of students who advocated a return to monarchism."
Vice News
claimed that "during the 1990s, Girkin wrote for the right-wing Russian
newspaper Zavtra, which is run by the anti-Semitic Russian nationalist Alexander Prokhanov" and where Borodai was
an editor. Writing for Zavtra ("Tomorrow"), Girkin and
Borodai, who too was reported to previously having fought with Girkin for
Russia-backed Transnistria and Republika
Srpska separatists in Moldova and Bosnia and Herzegovina, together covered
the Russian war against separatists in Chechnya and Dagestan. He
would also often write as "Colonel in the Reserves" on the Middle
East subjects, such as the conflicts in Libya, Egypt and Syria, for Georgia's
pro-Russian Abkhazian
separatist Russian language Abkhazian Network News Agency (ANNA).
Igor
Strelkov claims that he worked as a security chief for the controversial
Russian businessmen Konstantin Malofeev. The Prime Minister of the
self-proclaimed Donetsk Republic Alexander
Borodai was also a close associate of the businessman.
According
to Boris
Nemtsov, Strelkov-Girkin is a complete marginal, freak person. His
confederates recently tried to organize a rally in the support of "Novorossiya," and the rally
gathered up to 350 people. Andrey Piontkovsky adduces the name of Girkin
among the names of like-minded persons and says, "The authentic
high-principled Hitlerites, true Aryans Dugin,
Prokhanov, Prosvirin, Kholmogorov, Girkin, Prilepin
are a marginalized minority in Russia." Piontkovsky adds, "Putin has
stolen the ideology of the Russian Reich from the domestic Hitlerites, he has
preventively burned them down, using their help to do so, hundreds of their
most active supporters in the furnace of the Ukrainian Vendée."[93][94]
In his interview to Radio Liberty, Piontkovsky says, maybe the meaning of the
operation conducted by Putin is to reveal all these potential passionate
leaders of social revolt, send them to Ukraine and burn them in the furnace of
the Ukrainian Vendée. Moreover, this is namely what is prompted to him to do by
collective Remchukov in his writings...
In
his interview to Oleksandr Chalenko on 2 December 2014, Igor Girkin confirmed
that he is colonel of FSB. He also acknowledged that among the so-called
Novorossiya militants exists anarchy. Particularly militants of Igor Bezler act
independently, the so-called "Russian Orthodox Army" has split in
half, others forces represent a patched cover of various unrelated groups.
Girkin was also critical about the ongoing attacks on the Donetsk International
Airport calling them as pointless and harmful.
Critic
Former
colleagues of Girkin, Borodai and Malofeyev stated that Girkin lost contact
with reality, while commenting on his recent interviews, particularly Borodai
called him psychiatrically inadequate in interview with Ksenia Sobchak.
Leader
of political movement "Essence of Time" questioned Girkin
for actions in giving up Slovyansk to the so-called banderovites.
Notes
1.
The pro-Russian group Heroes of
South-East (Герои Новороссии)
published Strelkov's past military assignments, disclosed by himself on
military reconstructions forum: June 1993 – July 1994 military unit (в/ч) 11281
МО ПВО; Feb–Dec 1995 contract service 22033 «Х» (166-я гв. МСБР); 24 March 1995
till 10 October 1995 67th ОГСАД; August 1996 – July 2000 military unit 31763.
July 2000 – April 2005 military unit 78576. After 2005 military unit 36391. The
latter was identified as international terrorism prevention unit of FSB
(Управление по борьбе с международным терроризмом 2-й Службы ФСБ России).
2.
Uvais Nagayev was a resident of
Tevzani who was originally detained by the troops of the 45th DRR on 27 April
2001. After surviving a summary execution that killed Zaur Dagayev (Nagayev was
wounded and pretended to be dead), Nagayev was again detained by a group of
federal servicemen including Strelkov and then held for ransom before being
transported to Khankala
military base and vanishing without a trace. According to an FSB-connected
mediator, Nagayev had been tortured into confessing to unspecified crimes
before he was executed and his body was destroyed with explosives.
INTERNET
SOURCE: http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/europe/140722/8-things-you-should-know-about-igor-girkin-the-ukraine-separatist
Laura ColarussoJuly 22,
2014 10:44
8 things you should know about Igor Girkin, the Ukraine
separatist leader
He's been called brutal and deranged, and he may have shot down a
passenger jet. But did you know he also likes to play dress-up?
In
the aftermath of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 tragedy, the world's attention
turned again to eastern Ukraine, the crash site where pro-Moscow separatists
are fighting government forces. Much of the scrutiny has fallen on the rebels'
leader, Igor Girkin, especially since he reportedly bragged
about shooting down a Ukrainian aircraft at the same time and near the same
place where MH17 went down. (The separatists also didn't help their cause when
they blocked crash investigators from the site, took the aircraft's black boxes
and looted the debris.)
So
who exactly is this guy? Here are eight things you need to know about the man
who's leading the separatists in Ukraine.
 |
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The commander,
pictured with his bodyguards in Donetsk last week, claimed blood serum and
medication had been found at the site in eastern Ukraine [PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2697895/Now-rebel-commander-blamed-downing-MH17-says-bodies-aren-t-fresh-claims-corpses-dead-days.html]
|
1. He's a conspiracy theorist.
On
July 18, a pro-separatist website reported
that Girkin had accused Ukrainian authorities of stashing already deceased
bodies on the flight. "A significant number of the bodies weren't
fresh," the site, Russkaya Vesna, quoted Girkin as saying. "Ukrainian
authorities are capable of any baseness." He went on to say that he couldn't
confirm the information, but that many of the victims smelled as though they'd
been decomposing for a while.
2. He often goes by another name.
Girkin's
nom
de guerre is Igor Strelkov, which loosely translates to
"rifleman" in Russian. Leaflets circulated around mid-May in the
separatist stronghold of Donetsk referred to him as Colonel Igor Strelkov and
noted that he was in charge of the rebel operations in eastern Ukraine. He may
even go by a third name, Strelok, which is also a gun-related nickname.
3. He gets around.
The
fighting in Ukraine isn't Girkin's first combat experience. He's a veteran of
both the Russian and Soviet armies and has seen
action in Serbia, Chechnya and Transnistria, a Russian-backed breakaway
state in Moldova. He was also reportedly seen in Crimea during the time Russia
annexed the territory. Stella Khorosheva, a spokeswoman for the separatists,
says he "has rich military experience."
4. He enjoys historical re-enactments.
It's
been widely reported that Girkin, who was born in 1970, is an avid military
history buff to the point that he dresses up in costume for re-enactments.
There are pictures
of him on the Internet wearing medieval armor and uniforms from the World War I
era. He also belongs to a club called Markovtsy, a group dedicated to
re-enactments that was named after a Russian general killed by the Bolsheviks.
5. It's not clear what his ties to
Russia are.
Ukranian
intelligence authorities say
Girkin, who is from Moscow, is a top-level covert Russian operative. The United
States has accused Russia of sending "a steady flow of support" to
Girkin's operation. The Russian media, however, says that he served with the
Russian Federal Security Service, the country's internal security and
counterintelligence unit, but has long since retired. He and his supporters
maintain that they have no ties to Russia, and that Putin's government hasn't
given them a single gun or piece of military hardware.
6. He believes Russia should be doing
more to help his cause.
To
whatever extent Russia is involved
in stoking bloodshed in eastern Ukraine, Girkin believes the government should
take a more hands on approach to the conflict. He wants Putin's army to invade
and return eastern Ukraine, which the separatists refer to as
"Novorossiya," to its rightful place as part of Russia.
7. He dislikes the West.
It
may not come as a surprise to learn that Girkin has expressed strong anti-Western
sentiments, deeming
those societies "decadent." Girkin reportedly has a deep interest in
the history of his country and wants to instigate the re-establishment of the
Russian empire as a counterbalance to the West.
8. He has been sanctioned by the
European Union.
The
EU has imposed
sanctions on dozens of high-ranking Russian military officers and
pro-Russian separatists as the crisis in Ukraine continues unabated. Girkin was
added to that inauspicious list in April because European officials believe he
is on the staff of Russia's GRU, or it's military intelligence agency, and is
behind much of the fighting in eastern Ukraine. European leaders also cited him
for advising Sergey Aksyonov, the de facto prime minister of Crimea.
More from GlobalPost: Here's
all the evidence (so far) that pro-Russian separatists shot down MH17
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