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61-year-old Oleg Varyukhin has been charged with treason (Article 275 of the Criminal Code) because of the mandatory military levy he paid in Ukraine as an entrepreneur. This is the first known case in which paying taxes into the Ukrainian budget has formed the basis for a treason charge, Mediazona has found out.
Varyukhin had lived in Ukraine since the late 1990s and for many years ran a small cosmetics and perfume shop there. The military levy was introduced in the country in 2014 to fund the army. As lawyer Yurii Shel emphasises, this payment was compulsory: Varyukhin could not refuse it or influence how the state made use of the collected funds.
In the spring of 2026, Varyukhin came to Russia for the first time in many years to sort out paperwork. He had never had an internal Russian passport, and his foreign passport expired long ago. At Vnukovo Airport he was sent for additional checks. FSB officers asked him to unlock his phone and found saved receipts for tax payments and the details of the Ukrainian tax authorities.
After this, Varyukhin was arrested four times in a row for 15 days each, on charges of petty hooliganism. Two months later, he was sent to a pre-trial detention centre, this time accused of treason.
Varyukhin maintains that he has never received a Russian passport, and since the collapse of the USSR has not become a Russian citizen and therefore cannot be held responsible for a crime against the country. The man’s lawyer called the charges absurd. The court considers Varyukhin a Russian citizen. In September his detention was extended until 21 December, with the court noting that the accused is “prone to constantly changing his place of residence” and “possesses skills in keeping a low profile.”