Ukrainian ‘hacktivitists’ claim to have unmasked the Russian commander who is suspected of ordering the bombing of Mariupol theatre in which up to 700 died.
A group called Ukrainian Cyber Resistance name the senior officer as 41-year-old Colonel Sergei Atroshchenko.
He is commander of the 960th Assault Aviation Regiment and it was reportedly his planes that struck the theatre where local people were hiding from bombing on March 16, 2022, according to Ukrainian sources.
His warplanes also bombed the Mariupol maternity hospital one week earlier killing at least four people and injuring 16, leading to at least one stillbirth, it is claimed.
The Ukrainian cyber warriors sought to get Atroshchenko to cooperate with their investigation, but when he didn’t they revealed details of his personal life including intimate pictures his wife Liliya, 40, had sent him.
“The hacktivists noticed that Lilya likes to send 'photo surprises' to her husband,” said the report.
Believing she was communicating with her husband’s air force colleagues, she also agreed to pose with other wives at her husband’s air base in Primorsko-Akhtarsk close to the Sea of Azov.
The researchers passed their data to the international intelligence community InformNapalm and it has been sent to the International Criminal Court.
The group accuses Atroshchenko of being a “war criminal”.
They cite a Ukrainian official Pyotr Andryushchenko, advisor to the mayor of Mariupol, stating that the strike aircraft bombing the city “took off from the Primorsko-Akhtarsk airfield”.
He stated: "The number one killer of Mariupol residents has been established. The one who gave orders and controlled the bombing of the drama theatre, maternity hospital and children's hospital.”
He did not reveal further evidence against Atroshchenko.
Ukraine says that two 500-kilogram bombs were dropped on the drama theatre in which around 1,000 people, mainly women and children, were taking shelter.
Estimates of those killed varied from 300 to 700.
Russia denied that it was responsible for the carnage, claiming instead that it had been blown up by Ukraine’s Azov Battalion.
This has been refuted by several investigations.
The theatre strike was classed as a war crime by the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and Amnesty International.
