National Guard Markiv sentenced to 24 years by Italy judges

Today, the court in Pavia (Italy) has condemned Ukrainian serviceman Vitaliy Markiv  to 24 years of inprisonment. The judges have settled him to be guilty and being involved in intentional killing of Italian photographer Andreo Rocchelli in Donbas region in 2014., as to "Evropeyska Pravda" quoting Hromadske.ua. The prosecution demanded 17 years term. The sentence was delivered without statement of motivation. Also Markiv has to pay moral damage to the family of Rocchelli. The prosecution said Rocchelli had been killed intentionally. As to them, while Markiv was on Karachun mount, he transmitted the data  on location of the journalists to Ukrainian army. The defense of Markiv told the journalists being in war zone had no identificative marks of the press, so they got caught in the crossfire. The Italian side refused to  take investigative measures on the grounds and ignored proposition of Kyiv to form the common investigative group. The judge offered Markiv to say the final remark, as to Hromadske.ua. Taking advantage of the opportunity, he said he was a simple Ukrainian soldier, a patriot and added that he would always defend Ukraine. After that, the court went to the deliberation room. Verdict is expected around 2p.m. CET. IMI informed that the senior sergeant Vitaliy Markiv was detained on June 30 in Italy as a person suspected of murder of photojournalist, citizen of Italy, Andrea Rocelli and his Russian colleague Andrey Mironov near Slovyansk in 2014. Markiv, who holds both Ukrainian and Italian citizenship is being tried under Italian law in the city of Pavia. He denied the charges.