The Tribunal of the Wanted: How the Kremlin Is Buying Itself an Entire International Community

“Moscow has responded to the planned special tribunal for the crime of aggression against Ukraine with one of its own. Who sits on it says more about its creator than any verdict it could ever issue!”

In mid-May, thirty-six states and the European Union officially confirmed their intention to participate in establishing a special tribunal for the crime of aggression against Ukraine, which is set to begin operating in The Hague next year. The Kremlin has long since found its own answer. It bears the name International Public Tribunal for the Crimes of Ukrainian Neo-Nazis and Their Accomplices and operates under the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation. Seventy-two people belong to it. Among them are numerous “fake” foreigners who have long lived in Russia, along with convicted offenders and actual neo-Nazis. Every six months, this tribunal publishes reports about the alleged “atrocities” of the Ukrainian armed forces, and the so-called “waiters” appear as “witnesses,” those people who refused evacuation and eagerly waited for Russian tanks. The project is overseen by employees of the Presidential Administration from the propaganda department and by representatives of the intelligence services.

Its structure alone reveals its real function. By its nature, a court presumes that the judgment follows the process. Here it is the reverse. The verdict exists before the first witness is called, and everything afterward serves only to create the appearance of procedure. If someone wants to accuse the world of refusing to see while finding no world that agrees, all that remains is to create a world of their own. That is exactly what is happening here, one person at a time.

Chairman Grigoryev and the Director with the Stolen Tape Recorder

The tribunal was founded on March 1, 2022, four days after the beginning of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The idea is attributed to the head of the Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrykin. A source in the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation reported that “people were called in a rush and presented with a done deal, many do not even know they were included in the tribunal.” Chairman became Maxim Grigoryev, a native of Leningrad and a close acquaintance of Bastrykin. In the early 2000s he worked in election technology in Saint Petersburg, and after moving to Moscow he took over leadership of the Foundation for the Study of Democracy Problems, which receives multimillion-ruble funding from the Russian state budget. For a series of his own analytical broadcasts about the so-called special military operation under the title The Last Word Is Ours!, Grigoryev received 8,780,680 rubles in 2022, although no trace of these analytical programs could be found. Grigoryev is the author of propaganda works such as Antimaidan, White Helmets: Accomplices of Terrorists and Sources of Disinformation, Crimes of the US-Led Coalition in Syria, History of Lithuania, and Ukrainian Crimes Against Humanity. der Russischen Föderation berichtete, man habe „die Leute in aller Eile angerufen und vor vollendete Tatsachen gestellt, viele wissen nicht einmal, dass sie in das Tribunal aufgenommen wurden“. Zum Vorsitzenden wurde der gebürtige Leningrader und gute Bekannte Bastrykins, Maxim Grigorjew, bestimmt. In den frühen zweitausender Jahren befasste er sich in Sankt Petersburg mit Wahlkampftechnik, und nach seinem Umzug nach Moskau übernahm er die Leitung der Stiftung zur Erforschung von Demokratieproblemen, die millionenschwere Zuwendungen aus dem russischen Haushalt erhält. Allein für eine Reihe eigener analytischer Sendungen über die sogenannte militärische Spezialoperation mit dem Titel „Das letzte Wort haben wir!“ erhielt Grigorjew im Jahr 2022 die Summe von 8.780.680 Rubel, wobei es nicht gelang, irgendeine Spur dieser analytischen Sendungen aufzufinden. Grigorjew ist Verfasser von Propagandaschriften wie „Antimaidan“, „Weiße Helme: Helfershelfer von Terroristen und Quellen der Desinformation“, „Die Verbrechen der von den USA geführten Koalition in Syrien“, „Geschichte Litauens“ und „Ukrainische Verbrechen gegen die Menschlichkeit“.

In 2022, the supposed civil representative Grigoryev completed assault training and a one-month advanced course at the General Staff Academy of the Russian Federation and then traveled to occupied territories of Ukraine under the pretense of being a journalist in order to collect evidence of the “crimes” of the Kyiv regime.

According to a source in the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation, Grigoryev is in reality more of a public face, while the actual work is done by his longtime associate and director of the Institute for the Analysis of Neo-Nazi and Extremist Ideologies, Denis Teleshev. Teleshev met Grigoryev during an election campaign in Saint Petersburg and has followed him ever since. He does not like to speak about his youth because he is listed by the Interior Ministry due to robbery charges. In 1997 he attacked a woman with a knife and stole a tape recorder and bags from her. The judge took pity on the nineteen-year-old offender and sentenced him to three years suspended with a two-year probation period. The “robber” Teleshev now leads an entire network of volunteers who collect the desired testimony in occupied territories of Ukraine. Most of these witness statements about alleged atrocities by the Ukrainian armed forces are highly questionable because they were recorded from the words of the “waiters,” those people who refused evacuation. As a rule, these statements are unsupported and contradict known facts.

Supervisor Miroshnik and the Fugitive Kot

The tribunal’s supervisor from the Russian Foreign Ministry became Rodion Miroshnik, the former press secretary of the fugitive president Viktor Yanukovych. A special ambassadorial post was created specifically for him dealing with crimes of the Kyiv regime. In interviews, diplomat Miroshnik refers to his fellow countrymen as “Banderites” and claims that behind closed doors the West admits that “the truth is on Russia’s side, but politics matters more. And Ukraine shells civilians for donations.” In Ukraine, Miroshnik is wanted under several articles of the criminal code, including participation in the activities of a terrorist organization, and faces up to fifteen years in prison. Despite his status as a state official, Miroshnik promotes at every opportunity two funds collecting private donations from Russians, We Help Our Own and the Fund to Support Novorossiya. His wife Olga works for the television channel R1, which produces “patriotic” content.

Miroshnik’s phone connection records contain contacts with propagandists from the channels and outlets NTV, Tsargrad, Komsomolskaya Pravda, Rossiya-24, Zvezda, REN TV, and Life.ru. They also show that Miroshnik is in constant contact with Yuri Kot, who supports the tribunal’s public relations work. Back in the 2000s, Kot hosted a talk show in his native language on the Ukrainian channel Inter. Today he has completed a total reversal and declares that “everything Ukrainian was stolen from the Russians.” In December 2014, Kot was one of the organizers of the Kyiv Antimaidan, after which Ukraine placed him on its wanted list. In Moscow, the fugitive Kot lives in the so-called House of Residents on Goncharnaya Street, where generals of the Foreign Intelligence Service received luxury apartments. His second wife Alexandra Reshetnikova-Kot had previously been married to career intelligence officer Vadim Anishchik and together they conducted espionage activities in Italy. Her father is former SWR resident on the Balkans, General Leonid Reshetnikov. He played a major role in the failed coup attempt in Montenegro planned for October 2016. Authorities in the republic uncovered the conspirators in advance, among them Serbs, Kremlin loyal Cossacks, a local branch of the Night Wolves, and professional officers of military intelligence, the GRU. At the time, Nikolai Patrushev had to urgently travel to Serbia to contain the situation.

“Foreign Experts”: A Kremlin Lobbyist, a Blackmailing Policeman, and an Antisemite

For the United States, Grigoryev included Elena Chernykh-Branson in the tribunal, a woman wanted by the FBI and facing up to thirty-five years in prison. In 1991 she married Princeton economist William Branson, who was twenty-three years older than she was. After the marriage, doors opened for Chernykh-Branson to offices of many influential American and European officials. She spent most of her time in Nice and rarely visited her husband. In 2006 he died unexpectedly. According to his daughter Emily, “my father died deeply in debt because Chernykh spent his money like crazy. He left her his only asset, an apartment overlooking Central Park, which she sold for one million dollars.” After his death, the widow founded the Russian Center in New York and organized loud public actions supporting the Kremlin among immigrants from Russia. Alongside the Russian Center, Chernykh-Branson also took over the US branch of the Coordinating Council of Russian Compatriot Organizations, which is linked to Russian intelligence, and she traveled increasingly often to Moscow. In 2020, the FBI became interested in her activities and searched her home. She was accused of unlawful lobbying, failing to register as a foreign agent, and participating in fraudulent visa procurement for Russian officials. Branson fled to Moscow, and two years later her associate Nomma Sarubina was arrested on accusations of working for the FSB.

Alongside Chernykh-Branson, the tribunal includes Americans John Dougan and Charles Bausman. Dougan worked as a deputy sheriff in Palm Beach. In his home country, twenty-one criminal charges have been brought against him related to blackmail and unlawful wiretapping. In Russia, Dougan works closely with the Center for Geopolitical Expertise, led by Valery Korovin, the right hand of Russian fascist Alexander Dugin, and by GRU officer Yuri Khoroshenki. Khoroshenki, also known as Khoroshevsky, is a veteran of the notorious military unit 29155, known for the poisoning of the Skripals in Salisbury and sabotage operations across Europe. Yet funding from the GRU budget apparently does not satisfy the fugitive sheriff, because his résumé appears in closed databases: “Experienced manager in developing digital solutions, integrating artificial intelligence, and project management, completely independent from Western infrastructure. Built influential media channels with millions of views dedicated to events in Donbas and reports from the front. Interested in leadership positions: Product Director, Innovation Manager, or Strategic Adviser.”

Bausman, another American member of the tribunal, is closely connected to far-right organizations. He took part in the storming of the Capitol and had to flee to Russia because of criminal accusations. Earlier, this “fighter against neo-Nazism” had worked closely with well-known American Nazi Mike Enoch, who denied the Holocaust and saw Jewish conspiracies everywhere. In Russia, Bausman created the news site Russia Insider, where antisemitic views were promoted, and in interviews with Russian television channels he repeatedly stated that it was time to lift the taboo surrounding the Jewish question and that “hostility toward Putin’s Russia, especially in the United States and Britain, comes from Jewish circles.” Before fleeing to Russia, Bausman married Olga Solovyova, daughter of former KGB and SWR spy Igor Solovyov, who worked in Algeria under cover as a petroleum engineer. In 2006 Solovyov served temporarily as acting governor of the Nenets Autonomous Okrug and hoped to remain permanently, but Putin had another man from the FSB in mind, Valery Potapenko. Solovyov was removed because of his involvement in business enterprises, and Potapenko took over the region.

Sitting in the same tribunal as antisemite Bausman is Israeli citizen Guy Sandal. He was born in Kyiv and moved with his parents to Israel in the early 1990s. In Haifa he completed studies in design and served in the Israeli Navy. According to his social media accounts, Sandal once had little interest in politics, raising his children and pursuing cycling. Everything changed when an acquaintance brought the former sailor to the Russian consulate in Haifa. There he was asked to help organize the Immortal Regiment and distribute Saint George ribbons to local residents. Since then, Sandal has rarely left the Russian consulate, and lectures by political commentator Yakov Kedmi, who spreads pro-Kremlin messaging widely, gave his political views their final direction. With the beginning of the aggression against Ukraine, Sandal, apparently following advice from Russian diplomats, created the Israeli Anti-Nazi Front and moved into action: at times demanding the expulsion of Ukrainian ambassador Yevhen Korniychuk from Israel, at others expressing outrage that wounded fighters from the Azov Battalion were being treated in Israeli hospitals. His events, however, rarely attract more than a dozen people.

The Former Adviser to a Mayor, a Canadian with an RT Registration Address, and a Former Violinist

Belgium is represented in the tribunal by Valery Dvoynikov, the son of a well known judoka and multiple Soviet and European champion. The younger Dvoynikov previously worked as an adviser to the mayor of the city of Liège and in 2023 was even voted “Person of the Year” in a poll by the newspaper La Meuse. But the organization Ukrainian House in Belgium suspected the adviser of assisting wealthy Russians in obtaining Schengen visas and secured his resignation. Dvoynikov is a frequent guest at the Russian embassy in Belgium, works with the Russkiy Mir Foundation, and participates in discussion panels with well known pro Kremlin propagandists. Flight records show that besides Russia and Belarus, Dvoynikov visited occupied Luhansk in July 2022, something Belgian authorities apparently do not know.

Canada is represented in the tribunal by Grigoryev’s close acquaintance Eva Bartlett, who moved to Russia in 2019. During the Syrian civil war, the Canadian praised Bashar al Assad’s dictatorship at every opportunity and gained controversial attention through a video in which she claimed that rescue operations by the White Helmets had been staged. As the residence of the “independent journalist and human rights advocate,” as she describes herself, Moscow records list the office of Russia Today on Borovaya Street, and the broadcaster provides her with company vehicles.

France is represented in the tribunal by Christelle Néant, who obtained Russian citizenship. The Frenchwoman launched the pro Kremlin project Donbass Insider and organizes trips for “friends of Moscow” into the territories of the self proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics. Serbia is represented by Dragana Trifković, a member of the international association Friends of Crimea and contributor to the government aligned outlets Izvestia and Regnum. Cyprus is represented by Mikis Filaniotis, secretary general of the International Russophile Movement, and Mali by Umar Sidibe, a resident of the dormitories of the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia.

Indonesia’s representative in the tribunal is Fauzan Al Rashid. As a university student in Jakarta, he played the song Katyusha on the violin while wearing the cap of a Russian soldier and sent the video to the Russian embassy. Officials at the diplomatic mission took notice and, after a special review through intelligence databases, invited him at Russian state expense to travel to Moscow as an “independent observer” for the Russian presidential election. He returned from that trip as a different person: he put aside the violin and began telling everyone what a great president Putin was, that elections in Russia were fair, and that political repression and censorship in Russian media were inventions of Western propaganda. Fauzan found employment at Russia Today. Every year the Foreign Ministry awards him medals for productive cooperation, and chairman Grigoryev brought him into the tribunal.

In the end, this long list leads back to a single idea. A real court derives its legitimacy from asking after the truth, even when that truth runs against the interests of those who created it. The Moscow tribunal does not ask that question because its answer was fixed before it ever convened. It does not need evidence but faces, not judges but people who can be presented as judges, and not foreigners but the appearance that the world has taken its side. That among those sitting in judgment over the alleged Nazism of others there is also a close associate of an American Nazi and Holocaust denier is therefore not an accident. It is the clearest possible statement of how seriously the Kremlin itself takes the concept it constantly invokes.