THE HAGUE, Netherlands (CN) — A man claiming to be a Russian colonel turned himself in to Dutch police at Schiphol Airport on Monday, saying he has insider information about war crimes in Ukraine.
Igor Salikov told the evening news program EenVandaag that he had witnessed atrocities against civilians in Ukraine and was willing to share information with the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
According to videos posted to Telegram, Salikov arrived at the airport outside of Amsterdam in the evening with his wife and two children. Sources in The Hague have confirmed that he was in Dutch custody and has requested asylum in the Netherlands.
The 60-year-old says he rose to the rank of colonel before leaving the military to work for the Wagner Group, a private military organization that has operated in Ukraine and Africa.
The ICC did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Salikov says he’s written a letter to the court, detailing how he received orders from the Ministry of Defense and sometimes President Vladimir Putin himself.
Ukraine asked the world’s only permanent court for atrocity crimes to look into war crimes in 2014, following Russia's annexation of the Crimean peninsula. Following the full-scale invasion, the court’s chief prosecutor, Karim Khan, announced he would open an investigation.
In March, the court issued an arrest warrant for Putin and a deputy. Prosecutors say the Kremlin leader and his commissioner for children’s rights, Maria Lvova-Belova, are committing war crimes by abducting Ukrainian children with the aim of raising them as Russians.
Ukraine's top war crimes prosecutor, Yurii Belousov, says his office has confirmed some of Salikov's claims and has been investigating him in connection with war crimes.
“He gave important testimony, some of which has already been confirmed, related to the open invasion from Feb. 24, 2022,” Belousov said in a message.
The Dutch-led Joint Investigation Team looking into the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over Ukraine in 2014 is also interested in Salikov.
“If this person has specific and reliable inside information on the chain of command that authorized the Buk TELAR that shot down MH17, the JIT would be interested in receiving it,” the National Public Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement.
Three men were convicted in absentia by a Dutch court in 2022 of downing the Boeing 777 over eastern Ukraine and killing all 298 people on board. The ruling said there was an “abundance of evidence” that the passenger jet was brought down by a Buk surface-to-air missile obtained from the Russian military.
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