Russians in the US sentenced to life imprisonment

The Russian Taliban Khamidullin was sentenced to life imprisonment in the United States. Photos: Depositphotos.com

Russian citizen Irek Khamidullin, a former officer in the tank forces who turned over to the Taliban, was sentenced in the US to life imprisonment, reports Reuters.

This is the first process against a foreign fighter who fought in Afghanistan in a US court. Thus, the sentence of Hamidullin set a precedent.

According to Reuters, the verdict of the federal court was voiced by Judge Henry Hudson: life imprisonment and another 30 years in prison. During the trial, Khamidullin refused to testify in his defense, and delivered more than half an hour speech before sentencing. The agency does not report the details, but mentions that Khamidullin referred both to Jesus Christ and to Allah.

“In a well-planned, premeditated and carefully thought-out attack, Hamidullin led an attack on an Afghan post at the head of a group of militants, many of whom he himself recruited and trained, with the goal of killing members of the Afghan Border Police and the American soldiers assisting them,” he said in connection with by prosecutor Dana Boente. He called Khamidullin “a charismatic preacher of radical views who promotes Islamist violence.”

The Russian was captured in Afghanistan back in the 2009 year and was then held in a military prison located near the Bagram air base in the central province of Parwan. He was suspected of participating in several attacks on US and Afghan soldiers.

In March 2014, Konstantin Dolgov, Commissioner of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for Human Rights, Democracy and the Rule of Law, spoke about the case of Irek Khamidullin. “Attempts by the Russian Embassy in Kabul to carry out a full-fledged consular visit to Khamidullin remained unsuccessful. Russian representatives were given the opportunity to visit the air base in Bagram, but they were not provided with direct contact with a Russian citizen, citing alleged “unwillingness on his part,” he said.

Previously, Forum wrote about two more Russians detained in the United States. Smilyanets confessed on September 16 during his trial in federal court in Camden County, New Jersey.

A day earlier in the same court about his guilt said Another person involved in the case of a hacker attack is the Russian Vladimir Drinkman.

Sentences to Smilyanets and Drinkman are scheduled for mid-January, 2016.