Ukrainian Neo-Nazi gloats over brutally killed opposition activists, wishes their fate on all traitors A Ukrainian officer who at one point commanded the notorious Neo-Nazi Azov regiment has gloated on social media over graphic photos of dead members of an opposition party. The activists disappeared in early March from the Ukrainian-held city of Severodonetsk and appeared to have been extrajudicially executed, with Maksim Zhorin implying that a fate awaits all traitors. This is what the Patriots for Life from Severodonetsk look like now, Zhorin said in a Telegram warning: Graphic images posted on Wednesday. They disappeared on March 7, and now their new photos have appeared. I would not be surprised if the investigation finds out that they shot themselves in the head when they realized how stupid they were when they went to cooperate with Ilya Kiva, as a reference to the Ukrainian MP who fled to Russia in January.
The activists were missing on March 6, the day before they were charged with treason by the Kiev Prosecutors, an outspoken critic of President Volodymyr Zelensky. He had fled the country after being kicked out by his party, Opposition Platform — For Life. That did not save the party, and almost a dozen others, from being temporarily banned by Zelensky on March 20. A law allowing permanent bans was adopted on May 14.
Zhorin showed the badly disfigured faces of three men and a woman in body bags. They appear to have been extrajudicially executed in a cruel manner, according to the Telegram channel Witch Hunt, which first brought attention to the Azov leader's post.
Ukraine is not even medieval, the channel added, in reference to the Islamic State IS terrorist group, known for its savage beheadings of prisoners.
Severodonetsk became the seat of Ukraine's military administration for the disputed Donetsk region in the east of the country. It is a major stronghold of troops loyal to Kiev and is currently the site of heavy fighting with Russian and Donetsk People's Republic DPR troops.
Zhorin isn't just a member of Azov, a notorious Ukrainian militia that adopted Nazi iconography. He joined the unit in 2014, at the beginning of the turmoil in Ukraine, and commanded it from August 2016 to September 2017 even though his rank in the National Guard of Ukraine is only first lieutenant.
His official biography states that Zhorin took part in the taking of Mariupol and Marinka and survived the defeat at Ilovaisk in 2014. In October 2017 he set up the Kharkov regional branch of Azov's political wing, the National Corps, and became a member of the party's central committee in January 2020.