Raffaele Della Valle, lawyer for Ukrainian National Guardsman Vitaliy Markiv, who is accused of killing Italian photojournalist Andrea Rocchelli in 2014, has delivered a six-hour final argument at the trial in Pavia, Italy. Markiv’s defense lawyer said the court is attempting to assign blame in the photojournalist’s death rather than to find the actual culprit.
As reported on the website of Ukraine’s Interior Ministry (based on the report by U.S. government-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty), Della Valle said the prosecutor’s office in Pavia and the relatives of the deceased photographer are trying to place blame instead of attempting to discover who is responsible for killing Rocchelli five years ago.
As reported, Markiv was detained in Italy on June 30 on suspicion of killing Rocchelli. He is deputy platoon commander in the battalion of the National Guard of Ukraine named after General Serhiy Kulchytsky.
Markiv, who has both Italian and Ukrainian citizenship, has denied the charges.
