By Anton Zverev
LONDON, Oct 27 (Reuters) - A Russian IT specialist has been sentenced to 13 years in jail on charges of financing terrorism after the cryptocurrency exchange Binance passed details to Moscow of his donations to Ukrainian fundraising campaigns.
The 2nd Western District Military Court on Monday convicted 49-year-old Yuri Belenkiy and sentenced him to three years in prison plus 10 years in a strict-regime penal colony, according to a court statement.
Belenkiy, who has a Bulgarian residence permit, was detained in September last year when he flew to Moscow for a visit, and has been in custody since. He denied the charges, according to the court.
Belenkiy had responded to online appeals to help buy medical equipment for Ukrainian soldiers by transferring money from his Binance accounts to the Ukrainian military, according to Russian law enforcement documents seen by Reuters. Some payments went to the Azov Brigade or Azov Regiment, a particular bete noire for Moscow.
BINANCE ACCEPTED RUSSIAN INVESTIGATORS' REQUEST
The same documents showed that Binance provided Russian investigators with Belenkiy's transaction history last year, including records of transfers to Ukrainian fundraising campaigns, in response to a Russian request, and that the records were instrumental in prosecuting him, Reuters reported in August.
According to the records, Belenkiy sent more than $700 to the Ukrainian military in response to an online appeal by Arkady Babchenko, an exiled Russian critic of the Kremlin who supports Ukraine.
"The response from Binance serves as key evidence in the criminal case against Belenkiy," said Yevgeny Smirnov, a lawyer with the rights group First Department, which assists people facing politically motivated prosecutions in Russia.
Rights advocates who monitor such prosecutions say dozens of Russians have been convicted in recent years for donations made through cryptocurrency platforms to causes that authorities later classified as extremist or terrorist. Many used cryptocurrency because they believed it would keep their identities secret.
Asked on Tuesday about the sentence, Binance referred Reuters to a previous statement in which it said the exchange "does not make or enforce the laws of any jurisdiction, determine charges, or decide how any government uses information in legal proceedings". It said it does not comment on confidential law-enforcement requests or individual cases.
A lawyer who specialises in crypto regulation, Mike Bystrov, told Reuters in August that Binance, which left Russia in 2023 following Moscow's full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent imposition of Western sanctions, had been under no obligation to provide Belenkiy's data.
He said it might, in fact, have had obligations under European Union data-protection law not to do so because of Belenkiy's Bulgarian residency status.
(Editing by Kevin Liffey)