Former employees of Kharkiv unit of the Berkut riot police Andriy Khandrykin and Volodymyr Riyako, who are charged with torturing Maidan activists and journalists during the Revolution of Dignity, have been certified and continue to serve in the special police battalion.
“The said employees have passed certification on general grounds and in accordance with the conclusions of the certification commissions will be appointed as officers in the special police battalion, where they continue to serve,” Oleksiy Svyrydov, a senior expert at the Communications Department of the National Police in Kharkiv region, said in a video commentary issued on April 20.
“Their future fate will be decided by the court and we will execute this judgment in line with the current legislation,” Svyrydov stressed pointing to the presumption of innocence.
As reported, the former officer of Kharkiv unit of the Berkut riot police, Khandrykin, is charged with torturing the Maidan protest activists on January 20, 2014 on Hrushevskoho Street in Kyiv (Part 2, Article 127 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine).
Another former riot policeman Riyako is a defendant in criminal proceedings on the abuse of official authority (Part 1, Article 365 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine) during an incident between police officers and a film crew of Hromadske.tv which occurred at the Pisochyn checkpoint on January 28, 2015.
