The Unaccounted Conduct of Russian Irregular Units in Ukraine
Updated: 2 hours ago
By Vahagn Khachatryan
Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022. Both armies have suffered heavy losses. The Center for Strategic and International Studies estimates about 1.4 million Russian casualties and between 525,000 and 625,000 Ukrainian casualties, including killed, wounded, and missing personnel. Russia has used irregular armed units since 2014, particularly in eastern Ukraine, and Russia’s reliance on these units has grown significantly. Wagner and Akhmat fighters have violated international humanitarian law. A Wagner contractor executed a wounded Ukrainian prisoner of war near Mykolaivka who was already hors de combat. Bellingcat found that Akhmat fighters were present during the torture and execution of a Ukrainian prisoner near Lysychansk. Despite such documented incidents, holding individuals accountable for crimes committed by these irregular units remains a significant challenge. This report defines Russia’s irregular units, documents Wagner and Akhmat actions in Ukraine, and explains why authorities have held almost no responsible parties accountable.
What are the Russian irregular units?
Russia operates in Ukraine using units outside of the standard chain of command. Some, such as the Wagner Group, a private military company led by Yevgeny Prigozhin until his death in 2023, operate formally outside the state apparatus while relying on it for funding, weapons, and bases. Others, such as Akhmat, the Chechen forces led by Ramzan Kadyrov, belong formally to Russian state forces but answer in practice to Chechnya’s leader. The legal status of these units remains ambiguous. Although many of its fighters were Russian citizens, Wagner operated as a private military company, often designated a mercenary group. Meanwhile, Akhmat, whose fighters are commonly called Kadyrovtsy, functions as a militia.
Under international humanitarian law, “armed forces” is a broad category. Rule 4 of the International Committee of the Red Cross customary law study encompasses all organized groups and units operating under a command responsible to a party for subordinate conduct. Militias and volunteer corps meet this definition. Russia funded Wagner, continues to fund Akhmat, and has exercised varying degrees of control over both. Consequently, legal attribution to the Russian state varies by unit.
Since 2022, Russia has also deployed dozens of smaller volunteer formations, many of which initially fought without clear legal status. According to a BBC Russian report summarized by Meduza, authorities later assigned these formations to the Combat Army Reserve of the Country (BARS), which President Putin created by decree in 2015. BARS fighters sign contracts through military enlistment offices; however, they remain volunteers rather than regular servicemen and may leave after six months.
Another umbrella organization, Redut, operates as a fictitious private military company run by Russian military intelligence (GRU), according to a Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty investigation. Because its members sign civilian employment contracts, they legally qualify as neither soldiers nor volunteers. Units under Redut include Española, formed by football hooligans, and Storm-Z, comprised primarily of former prisoners. Moscow has never acknowledged Redut, maintaining that private military companies cannot legally exist in Russia. In each case, the Russian state maintains close involvement while keeping the legal status of these units ambiguous.
Wagner Group actions
Before the full-scale invasion, the Wagner Group comprised approximately 6,000 to 8,000 personnel. As the war progressed, its strength reached 50,000, the majority being inmates recruited from Russian prisons. In a report covering Feb. 24, 2022, to Feb. 23, 2023, the United Nations (UN) found reasonable grounds to believe Wagner contractors committed serious violations against prisoners of war. On June 26, 2022, a contractor shot and killed a prisoner who stated he had joined the Ukrainian army voluntarily. On Sept. 11, near Mykolaivka, another contractor executed a wounded prisoner for moaning in pain. On July 7, near Bakhmut, contractors wearing Ukrainian uniforms forced two prisoners to approach and attack Ukrainian positions, an act the UN noted may violate Geneva Convention III. On July 10, a wounded prisoner in Pervomaisk died after contractors denied him antibiotics and a catheter.
Former Wagner commander Andrei Medvedev, who fled Russia, stated that his men beheaded a Ukrainian prisoner. In April 2023, an audio recording of the head of the Wagner Group circulated on Telegram, in which he declared that Wagner would no longer take prisoners of war.
Beyond executions, survivors reported suffering beatings and threats during interrogation. A Ukrainian NGO reported that Oleksandr Koval, captured near Bakhmut in November 2022, stated Wagner soldiers bound him in wide scotch tape and beat him, apparently for fun. Ivan Dovhan reported that an interrogator smashed his left leg and right knee with a bat. Another prisoner, Andriy, stated that interrogators threatened him with rape to force a confession.
In June 2023, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu ordered all private military companies to sign contracts with the ministry by July 1. Amid rising tension between Shoigu and Prigozhin, the Wagner leader refused to sign. Prigozhin subsequently launched a mutiny. Wagner forces seized military headquarters in Rostov-on-Don and advanced toward Moscow. Prigozhin aborted the march on June 24 under a deal brokered by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko. Under the terms of the deal, Prigozhin agreed to relocate to Belarus and Russian authorities agreed to drop all charges against him. On Aug. 23, 2023, Prigozhin and Wagner co-founder Dmitry Utkin died in a plane crash north of Moscow. Although Western officials suspected foul play and the Kremlin denied involvement, the cause of the crash remains disputed.
Following Prigozhin’s death, Russian state structures absorbed Wagner Group mercenaries. In Syria and several African countries, fighters signed contracts with the Defense Ministry, which reorganized African operations into the Africa Corps. Akhmat’s leaders also claimed to have absorbed former Wagner fighters.
Akhmat forces
Akhmat forces, commonly known as Kadyrovtsy, formed around 2003, when former Chechen leader Akhmad Kadyrov began recruiting former warlords in his private militia to enforce his rule. Akhmad Kadyrov was assassinated in 2004. His son, Ramzan Kadyrov, took command and currently leads Chechnya.
Formally, Akhmat units belong to the Rosgvardia (Russian National Guard) and the Defense Ministry, though Grozny controls them in practice. On the eve of the invasion, Kadyrov paraded approximately 12,000 security personnel in Grozny. That number reached as many as 33,000 by April 2026.
On Feb. 26, 2022, two days after the invasion began, Kadyrov announced the deployment of Chechen fighters to Ukraine. According to Riddle Russia, military leadership sent Rosgvardia units, including the 141st regiment and the SOBR Akhmat special police unit, among the initial invasion forces. The Kadyrovtsy contributed to Russian advances in Mariupol, Severodonetsk, and Lysychansk in 2022. In June 2022, Kadyrov announced the creation of four new Defense Ministry units. Following Wagner’s withdrawal from Bakhmut in May 2023, the Institute for the Study of War reported that Russia might attempt to replace Wagner mercenaries with Kadyrovtsy. Kadyrov claimed that command has dispatched over 70,880 fighters from Chechnya to Ukraine since 2022, with approximately 14,000 fighters deployed in key areas.
Documented evidence of war crimes is less extensive for Akhmat than for Wagner, though investigative reports detail one prominent case. In July 2022, online videos surfaced showing the mutilation and shooting of an apparent Ukrainian prisoner near Lysychansk. Bellingcat placed Akhmat fighters at the scene, though a fighter traced by investigators denied involvement. In January 2023, Ukraine’s Security Service (SSU) identified an Akhmat rapid-response commander within the Rosgvardia and issued him an in absentia notice of suspicion regarding torture in Makiivka, Luhansk region. According to the SSU, seven fighters under his command abducted a woman from her home on April 12, 2022, taking her to a makeshift torture chamber where they electrocuted and beat her with a metal pipe before she escaped to Ukrainian-controlled territory.
Accountability of Irregular Units
In early 2023, Ukrainian Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin issued a notice of suspicion against Prigozhin, who was accused of “encroachment on the territorial integrity and inviolability of Ukraine.” Kostin added that Ukrainian authorities would prosecute Wagner fighters of all ranks, including those who fled abroad. In practice, results remain limited. Norwegian authorities arrested former Wagner Group fighter Andrei Medvedev under immigration laws rather than filing war crimes charges.
In July 2023, Finnish authorities detained Voislav Torden, also known as Yan Petrovsky, at Helsinki Airport. Torden co-founded and served as deputy commander of Rusich, a unit that fought alongside Wagner. On March 14, 2025, the Helsinki District Court sentenced Torden to life imprisonment after convicting him of war crimes committed in Ukraine in 2014. This marked the first conviction outside Ukraine of a Russian irregular unit fighter for war crimes, prosecuted by Finland under universal jurisdiction. In August 2026, the Court of Appeal upheld the conviction on three counts, acquitted him on remaining counts, and reduced his sentence to 12.5 years.
In August 2022, the SSU notified Iznaur Musayev, commander of an Akhmat rapid-response unit, of suspicion of violating the laws and customs of war alongside intentional murder. In January 2024, the SSU indicted Magomed Daudov, chairman of the Chechen parliament, for his role in forming and deploying Akhmat regiments to occupied Ukraine. In September 2025, SSU investigators notified Kadyrov in absentia of war crimes suspicions. According to the investigation, Kadyrov instructed his soldiers to execute Ukrainian troops rather than taking prisoners. The SSU also established that Kadyrov ordered troops to place Ukrainian prisoners on the roofs of Grozny military facilities to serve as human shields.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued six public arrest warrants strictly for senior Russian officials and military commanders, excluding leaders or members of irregular units. Several factors limit accountability. First, Russia is not a party to the Rome Statute and refuses to cooperate with the Court. However, this does not strip the Court of jurisdiction. Ukraine accepted ICC jurisdiction over crimes committed on its territory since 2014 and became an official State Party on Jan. 1, 2025.
Second, the ambiguous legal status of irregular units weakens legal cases against both Russian state and individual fighters. Regarding state liability, few Wagner fighters legally qualify as mercenaries, because of their Russian citizenship. Under the “effective control” standard, attributing fighter conduct to Russia requires evidence of tactical control, which remains scarce, though a court could still potentially establish that Russia had overall control. Even after Putin acknowledged in June 2023 that the state funded Wagner, financial backing alone does not satisfy the effective control threshold.
Regarding individual liability, the ICC must link named suspects directly to a crime as either perpetrators or commanders under Article 28 of the Rome Statute. Establishing this link proves difficult because Wagner’s chain of command remains opaque, and two legal scholars question whether the group maintained a formal disciplinary system. Although Akhmat units formally belong to Russian state structures, they answer in practice to Kadyrov, obscuring the origins of specific operational orders. In the Lysychansk case, Bellingcat confirmed the presence of Akhmat fighters at the scene but could not identify the specific perpetrator.
Genocide Watch recommends:
European states should investigate and prosecute members of Russian irregular units under universal jurisdiction, following Finland's precedent, and screen arriving combatants as potential criminal suspects.
The ICC Prosecutor should seek arrest warrants for commanders of Wagner-linked and Akhmat units rather than focusing exclusively on senior state officials.
Ukraine should keep gathering evidence and sharing it systematically with the ICC and foreign prosecutors.
The Council of the European Union should impose sanctions on mid-level commanders of irregular units designated as suspects, including the Akhmat commanders identified in this report.
The UN Human Rights Council should launch a formal inquiry into the Wagner Group.
