'Cut off the head' — Ukrainian intelligence accuses 'Putin's favorite' brigade of another war crime
Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) on July 12 published an audio allegedly capturing a company commander from Russia's infamous 155th Marine Brigade issuing an order to "cut off the head" of a Ukrainian soldier.
"Cut off the head, impale it on a pike, throw it the f**k away," says the voice attributed by HUR to the commander of the brigade's 2nd Air Assault Company.
The intelligence agency said the order, intercepted on July 10, concerned a Ukrainian prisoner of war (POW). The Kyiv Independent could not verify the audio's authenticity.
The 155th Marine Brigade, currently deployed in Ukraine's northeast Sumy Oblast, has been accused of numerous war crimes and atrocities during the full-scale war.
Ukrainian forces have repeatedly targeted the unit's command posts with precision strikes, killing its commander, Colonel Sergey Ilyin, in an attack in Kursk Oblast on July 2, HUR said.
Twenty-two people, including Major General Mikhail Gudkov, a deputy head of the Russian Navy, were reportedly killed during the Ukrainian HIMARS strike against the brigade's command post in Korenevo in Kursk Oblast on that day.
Ilyin's death was also confirmed by Russian authorities earlier this week, though the cause and date were not disclosed.
"For inhumane torture and barbaric killings of captured Ukrainian military personnel and civilians, the 155th Brigade of the Russian Armed Forces has become one of Vladimir Putin's favorite units," the Ukrainian intelligence agency said.
HUR recalled a case when the unit's flag was raised behind Putin during his press conference in December 2024.
Service members of the 155th Brigade have also been linked to war crimes committed during the occupation of Bucha, Irpin, and Hostomel in Kyiv Oblast during the early months of the full-scale invasion in 2022.
Other Russian units have been accused of war crimes throughout the full-scale war. Ukrainian prosecutors documented at least 273 Ukrainian POWs summarily executed by their Russian captors.
Kyiv and the U.N. have raised alarm over the rising number of such cases, saying they point to a systematic policy by Russia to murder Ukrainian captives. Half of the document cases were recorded this year alone.