Former activists of the National Corps, a right-wing party, on May 8 accused their ex-colleagues of assaulting them. They claimed that Andriy Biletsky, the party’s leader, led the attack.
Two prominent ex-members of the National Corps said that they were beaten up by their former colleagues for their public support of Serhiy Sternenko, a high-profile nationalist activist from Odesa.
In 2018, Sternenko was assaulted and killed the attacker. The Sternenko case has attracted a lot of public attention, with some defending the incident as genuine self-defense and others portraying him as a murderer.
The National Corps and Biletsky dismiss the accusations as “lies.”
Alleged beating
Biletsky is both the leader of the National Corps and the founder of the affiliated volunteer Azov Regiment. He is one of the faces of the nationalist activists in Ukraine, frequently appearing on political talk shows.
Serhiy Filimonov, a veteran of the Azov Regiment and former head of the National Corps’ Kyiv branch, and Nazariy Kravchenko, a former deputy head of the corps, said they were beaten by Biletsky, Azov’s security unit, National Corps activists and Biletsky’s security guards on the evening of May 7. Filimonov said that they had been accompanied by Ihor Malyar, an Azov veteran who was also allegedly beaten.
According to Kravchenko and Filimonov, Biletsky invited them to talk. But as they came, according to them, Biletsky and his associates tried to persuade them to stop their support for Sternenko, who is accused of murder. At that point, the activists claim Biletsky and his associates got physical.
“Blows to our heads and ‘interrogations’ were their main arguments,” Kravchenko said on Facebook.
National Corps’ response
The National Corps dismissed the accusations as “libel”, “lies” and “absurdity.” The party argued that it had always supported the right to self-defense and was ready to help Sternenko.
However, previously Biletsky had publicly lambasted Sternenko, accusing him of being involved in drug trafficking — something that Sternenko denied.
Moreover, the National Corps said the meeting was devoted to “unacceptable behavior” from the standpoint of “Azov and veteran ethics” and had nothing to do with the Sternenko case or politics.
“All words about torture and beating are lies,” the party statement said. “Moreover, there were more people on the side of the so-called ‘victims’.”
The press offices of Biletsky and the National Corps did not respond to requests for further comment.
Filimonov’s explanations
Filimonov denied the National Corps’ narrative. He told the Kyiv Post that only the Sternenko issue had been discussed at the meeting.
He said that Biletsky’s supporters had criticized him for failing to back Biletsky when Sternenko’s girlfriend lashed out at him on Twitter.
Filimonov said that there were only three of them against 30 Biletsky supporters.
Sternenko case
In 2018 Sternenko, a nationalist activist based in Odesa, was assaulted three times. During the third incident he killed the attacker by stabbing him with a knife.
In April, Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova said that Sternenko would be charged with murder. No formal charges have been brought yet.
Sternenko has consistently opposed Interior Minister Arsen Avakov and taken part in protests against him.
Meanwhile, Biletsky’s Azov regiment is part of Avakov’s Interior Ministry, and several of its leaders have gotten top jobs at the ministry.
Filimonov told the Kyiv Post he and Kravchenko won’t report the attack to the police.
“First, that’s not how we usually solve these issues,” he said. “Second, what would it do for us? Would Avakov investigate it?”
