Collaborator Yevhen Balytskyi, head of the Russian occupation administration in the temporarily occupied part of Zaporizhzhia Oblast, has been sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment, UNN reports with reference to the SBU.
Details
As the investigation established, the Gauleiter organized the mass abduction and illegal export of Ukrainian grain in the interests of the aggressor country.
According to the investigation, after the capture of part of the territory of the southern region of Ukraine, Balytskyi began to implement the Kremlin's instructions for the complete looting of local farmers and agricultural companies.
Threatening with weapons, imprisonment, and physical violence, the Rashists seized the private property of agricultural entrepreneurs, primarily Ukrainian grain.
Then the occupation "governor" Balytskyi ensured the illegal export of the looted products at the request of the Russian Federation.
The main "routes" for grain ran from Mariupol, and then to the ports of Rostov-on-Don or temporarily occupied Crimea, with further transshipment to Middle Eastern countries.
According to available data, in this way, the Gauleiter organized the theft of almost half a million tons of Ukrainian grain in 2025 alone.
Based on the evidence collected by the Security Service investigators, the court found Balytskyi guilty under three articles of the Criminal Code of Ukraine at once:
▪️ Part 8 of Art. 111-1 (collaboration activities);
▪️ Part 3 of Art. 27, Part 1 of Art. 111-2 (organization of complicity with the aggressor state);
▪️ Part 2 of Art. 28, Part 1 of Art. 438 (war crimes committed by prior conspiracy by a group of persons).
The SBU reminded that the convicted person is a former people's deputy from the banned Party of Regions, who at the beginning of the full-scale war was one of the first to publicly support the Rashists. After that, they appointed him Gauleiter in the temporarily occupied part of Zaporizhzhia Oblast.
According to SBU materials, Balytskyi already has an in absentia conviction in the form of 15 years of imprisonment with confiscation of property for organizing the Russian pseudo-referendum.
Comprehensive measures are underway to bring the perpetrator to justice for crimes against Ukraine.
The investigation was conducted under the procedural guidance of the Prosecutor General's Office.