I hope one day every Russian criminal will be punished

In the Kharkiv region of Ukraine, police chief Serhii Bolvinov heads a team dedicated to gathering evidence of war crimes against innocent slain civilians. Express Investigations Editor ZAK GARNER-PURKIS reports on his heroic and dangerous battle to deliver justice

- ZAK GARNER-PURKIS

As Putin’s war machine began its brutal invasion not long after, Serhii came to realise his responsibilities would be vastly different from those of any police officer in Kharkiv until now.

Of course, it can be the case that police officers face personal danger in peacetime, but this is different.

“We are a target for the Russian military,” Serhii adds, “some of my colleagues were killed by ballistic rockets, others have been killed by drones. [Investigating their deaths] is a different and hard situation. But it’s a crime and it’s our work, so we keep going.”

The efforts to bring those who've murdered, tortured and raped civilians to justice never cease in the secret offices of his investigative unit.

Serhii takes us there in his armoured car. Coffee in hand, the police chief navigates his way through the towers of documents filled with testimony and details of physical evidence to chat to his team. He stops to examine the faces of some suspects whose pinned-up photos stare out from concrete walls.

In one picture, a man convicted of killing five civilians is having a medal pressed on to his chest by Vladimir Putin. He is one of the many criminals protected by the Russian regime who Serhii’s team of investigators has successfully prosecuted in absentia.

I asked him if it’s frustrating to watch a president laud a man as a hero who he knows has committed such awful atrocities.

“I do this for the future,” he replies, “I hope one day every Russian criminal will be punished. In my mind, the Russian military who have [committed] war crimes are the same as Nazis from the Second World War.”

These sorts of prosecutions adhere to the same standards as with any other crime, although the chaos of war can sometimes make things harder.

Physical evidence and interviews often form the backbone of a case, with new technologies and military intelligence helping to identify suspects.