The Basmanny Court in Moscow arrested in absentia the commander of the Russian Volunteer Corps (RDK), Denis Kapustin, also known under the pseudonyms Denis Nikitin and White Rex, Interfax reported.
The court ordered Kapustin’s arrest as early as March 30, according to the court’s press service. Three days earlier, the Russian Interior Ministry had put the RVC commander on the wanted list.
Kapustin was charged in absentia with committing an act of terrorism (paragraph b of Article 205.3 of the RF Criminal Code), illegal trafficking in weapons (paragraph 4 of Article 222 of the RF Criminal Code), and illegal trafficking in explosives (paragraph 4 of Article 222.1 of the RF Criminal Code).
The FSB considers Kapustin to be the founder of the RVC. According to the special services, he was also involved in the attempted assassination of Konstantin Malofeyev, founder of the TV channel Tsargrad, and the attack on villages in the Bryansk region in early March. He is also credited with organizing a “sabotage and terrorist act” at an oil and gas facility in Volgograd Region in August 2022. Rosfinmonitoring put Kapustin on the list of extremists and terrorists.
In early March, members of the RVC entered the territory of the Bryansk region from the side of Ukraine in the villages of Lyubechane and Sushany.
The Ukrainian authorities stated that they were not involved in this action. But Kapustin himself explained in an interview with the Financial Times that the operation in the Bryansk region could not have taken place without the approval of the Ukrainian authorities.
