‘He’s back on Ukrainian soil’ After ten years in Russian captivity and several days in basement detention at the Georgian border, political prisoner Andriy Kolomiyets returns to Ukraine
Euromaidan activist Andriy Kolomiyets, who was imprisoned in Russia for the past 10 years, is now a former political prisoner. At a press conference in Kyiv on July 11, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Heorhiy Tykhyi announced that Kolomiyets was “back on Ukrainian soil,” explaining that Russian authorities had “deported” him via Georgia. In turn, Kolomiyets’s Russian defense lawyer wrote on Facebook that his client had been held in a basement inside the Georgian border crossing’s transit zone for several days, alongside more than 60 other Ukrainian citizens. Here’s what we know about the circumstances surrounding Andriy Kolomiyets’s return to Ukraine.
Euromaidan activist and political prisoner Andriy Kolomiyets was formally released from prison in January 2025, after serving a 10-year sentence in Russia handed down to him by a court in occupied Crimea.
But as his Russian defense lawyer, Mikhail Benyash, explained in a Facebook post, the Ukrainian national was immediately moved to a “deportation center,” a detention facility for those awaiting expulsion from Russia. According to Benyash, his client remained in custody there until earlier this week.
Announcing Kolomiyets’s return to Ukraine at a press conference in Kyiv on July 11, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Heorhiy Tykhyi told journalists that Russian authorities had “deported” Kolomiyets on July 7. He was dropped off at the Verkhny Lars border crossing with Georgia without any valid documents, Tykhyi said.
As Tykhyi explained, the Ukrainian Embassy in Georgia established contact with Kolomiyets and issued him the necessary documents to enter the country. “Following that, the embassies of Ukraine in Georgia and Moldova coordinated Andriy Kolomiyets’s entry into Georgia and onward travel to Moldova,” Tykhyi continued. “I can now confirm that he’s back on Ukrainian soil. He has returned home,” he added.
Meduza has condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine from the very start, and we are committed to reporting objectively on a war we firmly oppose. Join Meduza in its mission to challenge the Kremlin’s censorship with the truth. Donate today.
In his Facebook post, Benyash provided more details, writing that Kolomiyets spent “several extremely disgusting days in the basement of the Verkhny Lars border checkpoint.” And he wasn’t the only one being held in the transit zone on the Georgian side of the crossing — 64 Ukrainian nationals were in custody there too, Benyash said.
The lawyer later clarified that there were 61 men and three women in the checkpoint basement, adding that Kolomiyets was the only one “sent” back to Ukraine. “The situation there is absolutely disgusting, but I won’t describe it,” Benyash wrote. “Let’s wait until Andriy goes on air and tells the whole story.”
Later on July 11, the Ukrainian news outlet Graty reported that Kolomiyets was taken to a military recruitment office immediately upon his return to Ukraine. The report was later updated to clarify that he had been released following document checks. “Andriy Kolomiyets was released after the verification of his documents at the TRC [territorial recruitment center] and is now heading home,” Graty said, citing human rights groups.
Police in Russia’s Kabardino-Balkarian Republic arrested Kolomiyets in May 2015. He was 22 at the time and had come to Russia to visit his wife. A former Euromaidan activist, Kolomiyets was accused of throwing Molotov cocktails at Berkut riot police officers during the 2014 protests in Kyiv.
In June 2016, a court in Russian-occupied Crimea sentenced Kolomiyets to 10 years in prison on charges of attempted murder and drug possession. Though he initially confessed, Kolomiyets later retracted his testimony, claiming he had incriminated himself under torture. Both the European Parliament and the Russian human rights group Memorial declared him a political prisoner.
Memorial said on July 11 that the news of Kolomiyets’s detention at the Georgian border was first reported by his wife on July 8. At that point, Kolomiyets had already been in the checkpoint’s basement for 48 hours. As Meduza reported previously, the Russian authorities have been deporting Ukrainian nationals through the land border with Georgia since at least 2023.
