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Russia rejects Ukraine’s extradition bid for filmmaker convicted in terror plot

Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov was sentenced to 20 years in prison on charges of setting up a terrorist cell in Crimea and plotting terrorist attacks

Oleg Sentsov Valery Matytsin/TASS

Oleg Sentsov

© Valery Matytsin/TASS

KIEV, October 21. /TASS/. Russia’s Justice Ministry has refused to transfer the jailed film director Oleg Sentsov to Ukraine to serve out his prison term there, says a document posted by Ukraine’s Deputy Justice Minister for European Integration Sergei Petukhov on his Facebook page on Friday.

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"Since Russia and Ukraine have not signed the international agreement regulating double citizenship issues and as Oleg Sentsov is a Russian citizen, this convict’s extradition to Ukraine is impossible under the Convention on the Transfer of Sentenced Persons of 1983," Russia’s Justice Ministry said in the document.

On August 25, 2015, Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov, best known for his 2011 film Gamer, was found guilty of terrorism. The North Caucasus district military court in Rostov sentenced him to 20 years behind bars on charges of setting up a terrorist cell in Crimea and plotting terrorist attacks. In the spring of 2014, the group’s participants carried out two terror attacks, setting fire to the offices of Crimea’s Russian Community public organization and a regional office of the Untied Russia party. In addition, they plotted to blow up a monument to Vladimir Lenin.

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