{"id":12075,"date":"2017-10-27T19:40:54","date_gmt":"2017-10-27T19:40:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/informnapalm.org\/en\/?p=12075"},"modified":"2017-10-27T19:47:06","modified_gmt":"2017-10-27T19:47:06","slug":"russian-soldiers-identified-through-information-from-a-video","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/informnapalm.org\/en\/russian-soldiers-identified-through-information-from-a-video\/","title":{"rendered":"Russian soldiers identified through information from a video"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the following investigation, InformNapalm will demonstrate how a single video yielded a lot of information about the participation of regular Russian soldiers of 104th Air Assault Regiment (AAR) of the Pskov Airborne Division (military unit 32515, village Cherekha, Pskov Oblast). The video was made by a serving Russian military man in Ukrainian Donbas.<\/strong><\/p>\n

We came across an interesting photo in the social network profile of a former serviceman of the 104th AAR named Gherman Shachenkov (born January 15, 1968, resident of Smolensk, archived <\/strong>profile<\/strong><\/a>, photos<\/strong><\/a>, contacts<\/strong><\/a>). It is a group photo with Russian military personnel wearing white armbands. In the initial phase of the war in Donbas, they served as the identification feature for regular Russian servicemen and mercenaries of the illegal armed groups (IAGs) waging the proxy war in Ukraine. In the photo, one of the servicemen also holds a Novorossia shoulder patch in his hands.<\/p>\n

Link to the\u00a0photo<\/a>.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

We have also found an identical photo in another profile of Shachenkov in the OK <\/a>social network.<\/p>\n

An analysis of his contacts, friend list, and a photo collage<\/a> in his OK profile (photographs of the 6th company garrison memorial) corroborated our assumption about his service in the military unit 32515.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In the above photo with the white armbands, we have identified the following persons:<\/p>\n

#1: Ruslan Nikitin<\/strong>, who from time to time deletes his VK profile (https:\/\/vk.com\/id287304321<\/a>), but information about him remains stored in the archives<\/a>. Like Shachenkov, he also served in the 104th AAR.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

In Nikitin’s photo archives, we found the same photo<\/a> with the armbands, which was uploaded in December 2015 with a geotag pointing to the area of Luhansk. The photo received some comments from his colleagues:<\/p>\n

– Did you like it at the time?<\/em><\/p>\n

– Yes, the tour was f#cking great.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

This archived photo of Nikitin allowed us to identify person #2<\/strong> in this investigation. This is Alexander Avdeyev<\/strong>. The photo<\/a> was captioned as: “Avdey, me and Vadik”<\/em>, it was uploaded in July 2015.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

When we analyzed the list of friends in Nikitin’s profile, we found Alexander Avdeyev, alias Avdey<\/em>, under the surname of “Petrov”:\u00a0https:\/\/vk.com\/id12302272<\/a>\u00a0(archived\u00a0profile<\/a>,\u00a0photos<\/a>,\u00a0contacts<\/a>). His name is also visible on the uniform nametape in the photos<\/a> made by his friends.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

And person #3<\/strong> of our investigation is the aforementioned Gherman Shachenkov<\/strong>. We have not yet been able to identify the other people in the group photo.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

In Shachenkov’s VK profile, we found a YouTube video of a certain Vladimir V, uploaded on September 05, 2014.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n