KIEV, April 2 (RIA Novosti) - A Ukrainian investigative committee has ruled as lawful the actions of special operations officers who killed far-right leader Alexander Muzychko, according to a report by Ukraine's Ministry of Internal Affairs published Wednesday.
Muzychko, also known as Sashko Beliy, was gunned down in an operation by Ukranian special forces in the western city of Rivne last month. At the time of his killing, the ultranationalist was wanted by police on charges of hooliganism and assaulting a government prosecutor.
According to the results of the investigation, Muzychko attempted to escape through a window and opened fire on law enforcement, injuring one of the officers. Muzychko was shot in his leg, but tried to return fire. He kept shooting after he was kicked down to the ground, accidentally fatally shooting himself in the chest.
Muzychko was put on an international wanted list on suspicion of torturing and murdering at least 20 Russian servicemen in Chechnya in the early 2000s. He was arrested in absentia by a court in southern Russia earlier this month.
The Ukrainian Right Sector movement, along with Muzychko, is a major ally of the neo-Nazi Svoboda party led by Oleh Tyahnybok, a member of the new Ukrainian government and an active promoter of the ideas of Stepan Bandera. Bandera, a Ukrainian who collaborated with Nazi Germany during World War II, was involved in mass atrocities in the wartime ethnic cleansing of Poles, Jews and Russians.
Moscow has described uprising in Kiev as an illegitimate fascist coup, which resulted in taking steps to protect ethnic Russians in Ukraine and reunification with Crimea. The reunification of Crimea with Russia was finalized on March 18, following a referendum and the republic's appeal to Moscow to rejoin the country after having been gifted to Ukraine by Soviet leaders 60 years ago.
