Russian Army Chief Lists Ukraine Figures To Put on Trial Like 'Nuremberg'

A senior Russian military official has cited a list of Ukrainian figures, including several politicians and journalists, Russia intends to take to court for war crimes "like the Nuremberg trials."

The Nuremberg trials were held between November 1945 and October 1946 after the Second World War ended. The Allies—then France, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and the United States —held the trials against representatives of defeated Nazi Germany for plotting, invading other countries and carrying out other war crimes during World War II.

Russian State Duma Deputy Defense Committee Chairman Vladimir Shamanov, a former commander in chief of the Russian Airborne Troops, made the Nuremberg comparison in an interview on Russian television on Sunday.

Asked by a Russian journalist how Moscow would deal with Mariupol, the port city in southeastern Ukraine that has been bombarded and taken by Russian military, Shamanov said: "We'll help with Mariupol."

"We'll also get to their billionaires, together with their political leadership like bastards like [Ukrainian politician Oleksandr] Turchynov, dirtbags like [activist and politician Dmytro] Yarosh. We'll remember them all by name like our commander in chief said, all of them will be held accountable," Shamanov added.

"We have the preliminary components to form an international tribunal. We're holding discussions with China about that, along with other BRICS [Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa] countries. There will be an international tribunal, 100 percent, like the Nuremberg trials."

He said that Ukrainian journalist Dmitry Gordon and Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych would also face trial.

In March, the Russian Investigative Committee opened a criminal case against Gordon. The journalist and Ukrainian television host, who is reportedly still in Kyiv, was charged with public calls to start a war, inciting hatred on the basis of nationality and publicly spreading fakes about the actions of the Russian Armed Forces.

"We'll see how they'll squirm on their behinds on those benches," Shamanov said. "We should hammer some nails in there, too, like commercials they show about hemorrhoids. We'll give them hemorrhoids on top of it all."

Newsweek has contacted the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for comment.

Shamanov was also asked by the host about what the territorial boundaries of Ukraine could be like at the end of Russia's "special military operation," which Russian President Vladimir Putin launched on February 24.

"This issue would be most difficult to predict. We don't know the future mindset of the population or our future relations with neighboring countries which will certainly try and exert influence," Shamanov said, citing the Baltic states and Poland as examples.

He said that Russia's aim was to "fully demilitarize" Ukraine, and that would like take "five to 10 years."

"Secondly, its denazification, which will be happening simultaneously and the formation of the government that wasn't sullied by these neo-Nazis. This will be difficult to accomplish so we'll have to see."

Russian lawmakers, including Putin, have consistently claimed that Ukraine is being governed by neo-Nazis, despite the fact that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is Jewish and many of his relatives were killed during the Holocaust.