The Short Careers And Violent Deaths Of Ukraine's Kremlin-Backed Separatists

Oleh Popov, 1972-2023

Born in Soviet Ukraine's Luhansk region, Popov ran a business making knitwear before getting involved in the Russia-backed separatist movement. He served as a de facto lawmaker in the part of the Luhansk region controlled by separatists.

In September 2022, his “death” was falsely reported, with the announcement later described as an “operational game” by separatist authorities to uncover assassination plots. In December 2023 he was killed in Luhansk by a bomb hidden in his car, reportedly by a Ukrainian assassination team. 

Mykhaylo Filiponenko, 1975-2023

Born in the Luhansk region, Filiponenko worked as a miner and businessman before joining the separatist militia in 2014. As a member of the Russian-installed regional assembly in the part of  Luhansk administered by separatists, he was killed in November 2023 when a bomb exploded inside his car. Ukraine claimed responsibility for the assassination.

Aleksandr Zakharchenko, 1976-2018

Born in Donetsk to an ethnic Ukrainian father and a Russian mother, the former businessman was among the first in the Donbas to pick up a weapon in 2014. In April that year, he led several separatists in seizing the Donetsk city council and calling for a referendum on the region’s secession from Ukraine. He later rose to become leader of the separatist-controlled part of Donetsk with the belief that “the great country that was called the U.S.S.R. must be brought back.” In August 2018, a bomb hidden inside the entrance to a Donetsk cafe was detonated remotely as Zakharchenko walked inside, killing him and a bodyguard. 

Mikhail Tolstykh, 1980-2017

Tolstykh was known by his call sign “Givi,” after his ethnic Georgian great-grandfather. Born in Soviet Ukraine's Donetsk region, he served for two years in Ukraine's military in the late 1990s. The husky-voiced militant claimed he was rejected from professional service due to a “speech impediment.” He worked as a security guard and forklift driver before joining the separatists.

Givi’s Somalia Battalion was named for the bedraggled appearance of his men who reportedly resembled Somalian pirates after an early battle with the Ukrainian military. Givi was filmed abusing Ukrainian prisoners of war during the battle for Donetsk airport. In February 2017, he was killed by a thermobaric projectile that was fired through the window of his office in Donetsk, reportedly by a CIA-trained Ukrainian assassination squad.

Valery Bolotov, 1970-2017

Bolotov (seated in the center) was born in Russia and served in the Soviet military. In 2014, he was working at a mine in the Luhansk region when unrest swept eastern Ukraine. He was named leader of the territory in Luhansk controlled by the separatists in April 2014 but stepped down from the role in August that year amid rifts within the entity's leadership. In January 2017 Bolotov died at his home in Moscow after meeting two men for coffee. According to his widow, Bolotov fell ill immediately after the cafe meeting and repeatedly asked, “Why did I drink that coffee?” in the hours before his death.

The man seen standing immediately to Bolotov’s right in the photo above is Gennady Tsypkalov, who died in murky circumstances shortly before Bolotov.

Gennady Tsypkalov, 1973-2016

Born in Russia’s Rostov region, Tsypkalov migrated with his family to the Luhansk region of Soviet Ukraine and worked various jobs, including as a truck driver. He served briefly as the head of the separatist entity in Luhansk and was viewed by Ukrainians as one of the most reasonable of the separatists, who kept his word when cease-fire agreements were made.

In September 2016, he was detained in connection with an apparent coup attempt against the separatist Luhansk leadership and died in his cell. The separatist authorities claimed Tsypkalov killed himself after realizing “the depth of his criminal actions.”
 

Yevhen Zhylin, 1976-2016

Born in Kharkiv in Soviet Ukraine, Zhylin worked in Ukraine’s police force before opening a mixed-martial-arts gym. During the unrest in 2014, Zhylin rallied members of his gym to attack pro-Ukrainian protesters, and was accused of kidnapping and torture. He spent one day as the president of a separatist entity that called itself the “Kharkiv People’s Republic," then fled to Moscow when the separatist movement in the city ran out of steam. In September 2016, he was eating with a friend at a Moscow restaurant when a man wearing a “fake moustache and a Panama hat” rose from a nearby table and shot Zhylin and his associate before escaping. Zhylin was killed instantly. 

Arseny Pavlov, 1983-2016

Pavlov was best known by his call sign Motorola after the brand of radio he used while serving in the Russian military. Born in Soviet Russia, he was working at a car wash in Rostov-on-Don before traveling to Ukraine amid the unrest in early 2014. He rose to prominence as a ruthless fighter with a penchant for chaos. Pavlov admitted to executing 15 Ukrainian prisoners, and was filmed firing grenades at random buildings to “wake up” residents in a Ukrainian town. In October 2016, Pavlov and his bodyguard were killed when a bomb in the lift of his Donetsk apartment exploded. 

Aleksei Mozgovoi, 1975-2015

Born in the Luhansk region of Soviet Ukraine, he served in the Ukrainian military before joining the separatist movement and leading the “Ghost Battalion” of Luhansk’s militia. He was a vocal critic of some in the Russia-backed separatist leadership and raised eyebrows by vowing to “arrest” women who go to restaurants and cafes. In 2014, Mozgovoi chaired a “people’s court” that sentenced an alleged rapist to death in front of the accused man’s screaming mother.

In March 2015, Mozvogoi survived an attack on his vehicle on a road outside Luhansk. Two months later his convoy was again targeted in a similar ambush that killed him and six other people.

Oleksandr Bednov, 1969-2015

After a career in the Soviet riot police, the Luhansk-born Bednov served in Ukraine’s Interior Ministry following the collapse of the U.S.S.R. When tensions broke out in eastern Ukraine in 2014, Bednov created a separatist militia that began patrolling Luhansk. He briefly served as the de facto minister of defense of the separatist-controlled Luhansk entity. 

In January 2015, Bednov was in a convoy that was hit with a barrage of gunfire and rocket-propelled grenades. He and six other people were killed in the attack. Soon afterward, the separatist authorities in Luhansk claimed that the military commander died while resisting arrest and claimed he was wanted for kidnapping and torturing local residents, while prominent separatist leader Igor Girkin called the killing a "gangster ambush."

Multiple memorials to slain separatist leaders have been created in Donetsk. This October 2020 image shows separatist militants at a memorial to Arseny Pavlov in Donetsk's "Alley of Heroes." To the right of the Pavlov memorial are monuments to militant Mikhail Tolstykh and singer Josef Kobzon, who supported the separatist movement up until his death in 2018.