Two more Russian soldiers pleaded guilty to crimes committed during the war in Ukraine.
Prosecutors urged the Kotelevska district court in central Ukraine to sentence Alexander Bobikin and Alexander Ivanov to be jailed for a dozen years for violating the laws of war, according to Reuters.
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The two men, who spent the hearing in a reinforced glass box, admitted that they belonged to an artillery unit that fired at targets in the Kharkiv region from Russia. The shelling, according to prosecutors, destroyed a school in Derhachi.
The men were described by the prosecutors as an artillery driver and a gunner. They were captured after crossing the border into Ukraine.
"I am completely guilty of the crimes of which I am accused. We fired at Ukraine from Russia," Bobikin told the court while Ivanov, in asking not to receive the maximum penalty, said, “I repent and ask for a reduction in the sentence.”
The verdict is expected to be handed down Tuesday.
One Russian soldier, Vadim Shishimarin, 21, was sentenced to life in prison earlier this week. He was the first to be sentenced for war crimes in Ukraine since the invasion began in February. He admitted to the killing of an unarmed 62-year-old Ukrainian man in late February in a village in the Sumy region of northeastern Ukraine.
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The Ukrainian prosecutor general's office is investigating more than 13,000 cases of alleged war crimes, and it has more than 50 suspects accused of committing war crimes. The office also has over 600 suspects whom it alleges were involved in the planning and initiation of a large-scale act of aggression using a state military force.
The United States, in partnership with the European Union and the United Kingdom, announced Wednesday the creation of an advisory group to help Ukraine’s war crimes investigations.