A Stavropol resident has been convicted in connection with a terrorist organization.

A military court in Rostov-on-Don sentenced a resident of Stavropol Krai to a lengthy prison term after finding him a member of a terrorist organization.

The 21-year-old man is a native of the Andropovsky District of Stavropol Krai and a resident of the municipal district of the same name. He was in custody prior to the sentencing.

According to investigators, in April 2025, the young man "joined a terrorist organization banned in the Russian Federation with the intent of subsequently committing crimes in its name." "During the investigation, the man fully admitted his guilt and repented of his actions," the regional Investigative Committee said in a statement.

The agency did not specify which terrorist organization was involved, what the joining procedure was, or what crimes the accused planned to commit. The prosecutor's office noted that the defendant was an "adherent of radical extremist views," without specifying what exactly those views were.

According to the prosecutor's office, the young man "voluntarily joined an international terrorist organization, thereby expressing his willingness to act in its interests." The agency's statement also made no mention of preparations for specific crimes.

The Southern District Military Court sentenced the man to 10.5 years in prison, with the first three years to be served in a maximum-security penal colony. The charge of participating in the activities of a terrorist organization (Part 2 of Article 205.5 of the Russian Criminal Code) carries a sentence of ten to twenty years in prison.

According to court records, the defendant's most recent sentence under this article was handed down today, May 4. The name of the accused in the case file, which was only submitted for hearing on March 10, is redacted. A previous verdict on a similar charge was handed down on April 30; the file for this case, which was submitted to the court in early April and heard in a single session, is also anonymized.

"Caucasian Knot" also reported that in late April, a military court in Rostov-on-Don sentenced Dmitry Syromyatov, a native of the Karachay-Cherkess Republic, to 18 years in prison, finding him guilty of activities in the terrorist organization Hayat Tahrir al-Sham*. In December 2024, the head of Chechnya announced the idea to remove the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham* group, which had seized power in Syria, from the list of terrorist organizations.

* The organization is designated as a terrorist organization and is banned in Russia.

** The activities of Meta (owner of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp) are banned in Russia.