[Video above from April 20, 2022. -- eds]
Well, this is just more of the same from the Kremlin. Adding insult to grievous injury, a father received a letter that his family was denied veterans' survivor benefits worth some 12 million rubles (~$135,000 USD) because the ship went down as the result of an accident. Putin had promised compensation for any soldiers or sailors killed in the Ukraine conflict.
Source: Kyiv Post
Russian Federation (RF) authorities informed family members of dead crewman from the cruiser Moskva that the state will offer them no survivor compensation, because the warship sank by accident not in military action, and their son’s whereabouts are unknown, news reports on Friday, May 6, said.
A letter from the RF Black Sea Fleet’s (BSF) prosecutor general’s office sent to Dmitriy Shkrebets, father of Moskva crew member Egor Shkrebets, and made public on May 6, said the Moskva’s Apr. 14 sinking took place in international waters by accident. The warship, by a substantial margin the BSF’s most powerful weapon, was in international waters and had not been participating in combat operations against Ukraine, and the younger Shkrebets’ whereabouts is not known, the RF navy letter asserted.
The official RF navy decision disqualified the Shkrebets family from veterans’ survivor benefits including 12 million rubles ($135,000 USD at current exchange rates) promised by Russian President Vladimir Putin in a May 3 national address to immediate relatives of Russian soldiers and sailors killed in Ukraine-related fighting.
