Updated on 12:29 a.m. Moscow Time
MOSCOW, September 3 (RIA Novosti) – The Russian Foreign Ministry has demanded that Kiev launch a complete and unbiased investigation into the murder of Rossiya Segodnya photographer Andrei Stenin, the ministry said in a statement on its website Wednesday.
“We demand Kiev launch a complete and unbiased investigation into the murder of A. Stenin and severely punish those who are guilty,” the statement reads.
Russian investigators confirmed earlier on Wednesday that Stenin was among those killed during an attack on a convoy of at least 10 vehicles carrying civilians in early August near Donetsk in eastern Ukraine.
Stenin went missing in eastern Ukraine on August 5. Sources said that the journalist was possibly held by the Ukrainian military, but Kiev has never officially confirmed the information.
On August 9, Rossiya Segodnya filed a request with the Ukrainian Interior Ministry to take action in order to locate Stenin, with the ministry undertaking the case on August 11.
On August 12, Anton Herashchenko, an adviser to the Ukrainian interior minister, said in an interview with Baltkom radio that security forces had arrested Stenin on charges of assisting terrorists. However, later Herashchenko claimed he was misinterpreted.
At the end of August, the Organization for the Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) reported that they found several bodies in one of the shot and burned cars alongside the Snizhne-Dmytrivka highway in eastern Ukraine. OSCE representatives claimed that Stenin could be one of the dead, but were unable to confirm it.
