A Kyrgyz man who was handed a suspended seven-year prison term for joining Russia’s armed forces and fighting in Ukraine is expected to obtain Russian citizenship, Russian Interior Ministry spokeswoman Irina Volk said over the weekend, RFE/RL’s Kyrgyz Service reported.
Askar Kubanychbek-uulu told Russian journalists that he had fled Kyrgyzstan via neighboring Kazakhstan and is currently in Russia. Meanwhile, according to a ruling in January by Bishkek’s Birinchi Mai district court, Kubanychbek-uulu was banned from leaving the Kyrgyz capital while serving a three-year probation period that was part of his seven-year suspended sentence.
The governments of all countries of Central Asia have warned their citizens against participation in the Ukraine war on either side. The Central Asian countries consider their citizens’ service in the army of a foreign state a crime, falling under the criminal-code article on mercenary activity.
