The British socialist faces life in prison for terrorist activity after he went to Moscow to help Pro-Russian rebels fighting government troops in Eastern Ukraine.
41-year-old Benjamin Stimson (Stimson Benjamin) was arrested when he flew back to Manchester. Earlier he gave an interview to the BBC in which he said that he was ready to kill people in war.
Stimson is a native of Oldham. In 2015, he spent four months in the Donbass, helping in the conduct of hostilities devoted Kremlin separatists after the Ukrainian revolution of 2014 created a self-proclaimed state.
In October 2015, the BBC interviewed him when he was in the East of Ukraine in the Donbass fighting formations. At the time of filming, he wore a mask to prevent reprisals against his family in Britain.
This former businessman and admirer Jeremy Corbin claimed that Russia was the victim of the aggression of Western imperialists. He said: “I came here as a working man without work. You know, in Britain it is no longer possible to live, these contracts without commitment, lack of housing. I therefore voted with their feet”.
He arrived in Moscow with 70 pounds, after which he was taken in Rostov, near the Ukrainian border.
Responding to a question about whether or not to die for this case, Stimson said: “I Think so, because I did something you can be proud of. I do not interfere, and I’m definitely not a terrorist, unlike the jihadists going to fight in Syria.”
According to him, he took little part in combat and never fired a single shot in a combat situation. But responding to a question about whether he is ready to kill, Stimson said: “If my life is under threat? Yes. I believe that this is a war. We wear uniforms. I think here to protect the civilian population.”
He hoped to obtain the Russian citizenship and to start in Donbas new life.
In the case of Stimson, a trial was held, and he in the Manchester court found the charges of promoting terrorist acts, under section 5 of the terrorism act.
The prosecution said that he “intended to commit terrorist acts with other people, becoming a member of the armed formations fighting against the Ukrainian state, and served as a soldier in these groups.”
The accusation that he had plotted attacks from the Stimson removed. Sentencing will be July 14. This is the first UK case of prosecution for terrorism in connection with the Ukrainian conflict.
Last year, when Stimson was indicted, the Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko announced the possibility of a full-scale invasion from Russia. From 2014 to 2016 during the conflict in the Donbass killed more than 9,500 people.
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Reader comments
Peter Wookey
What Russian does not give him citizenship? Probably realized that he was crazy.
Capt. Ramius
Stimson, a British extremist. He is no different from other home-grown extremists, whether Islamic jihadists or right-wing. And rightly so, that these people (and their organizations) are overtaken by the strong arm of the law.
SJR2020
Am I the only one wondering why a white British citizen indicted in his absence, while many Asians with British nationality to freely enter into the ranks of ISIS, and some then come back, and they won’t prosecute?
