A despotic general who ruthlessly rounded up and killed LGBT+ people in an act that became known as the “gay purge” has been killed in the fighting in Ukraine.
Magomed Tushayev, who was a military boss under the command of hardman Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, was killed in fighting at the Hostomel Airport, a key Russian target not far northwest of Kyiv.
Tushayev previously led the 141 motorised regiment of the Checnyan National Guard and his death was confirmed by a spokesperson for Ukrainian president Vlodomyr Zelensky.
Anti-LGBT+ purges were first reported in the southern Russian republic back in 2017 and reportedly involved kidnappings, torture and extrajudicial killings.
Under the leadership of the infamous Kadyrov, who recently said Vlaidimir Putin needed harsher tactics in Ukraine, Tushayev was key in the persecution of LGBT+ people.
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The general was specifically implicated in playing a role in the 2021 kidnapping of activists and gay man Ibragim Selimkhanov, who was kidnapped from a Moscow subway station and bundled into a car and then a plane before he was flown to Grozny, Chechnya’s capital.
He later questioned Selimkhanov, who then miraculously escaped back to Moscow.
Tushayev's death came only a day after Kadyrov boasted his forces had not suffered a single loss.
He said: “As of today, as of this minute, we do not have one single casualty, or wounded, not a single man has even had a runny nose.
“The president (Putin) took the right decision and we will carry out his orders under any circumstances.”
Chechen authorities always denied that an anti-LGBT+ crackdown occurred in the region.
Yet at a Council of Europe meeting last year the suppression of gay people in Chechnya was described as "the single most egregious example of violence against LGBTI people in Europe that has occurred in decades".
This comes as Russia continues its push to try and seize key Ukrainian cities.
In an intelligence update released this morning, the Ministry of Defence said that the Russian advance on the Ukrainian capital had made little progress overnight due to continuing logistical difficulties they believed.
However, there have been reports of a huge 40 mile long convoy of Russian armour heading for Kyiv which may shift the balance of the fight in Putin’s favour.
Throughout the night, Russian forces increased their bombardment of north Kyiv, and in the vicinities of Kharkiv and Chernihiv.
Alongside that, a failure to seize control of airspace of Ukraine has seen Moscow’s forces shift to night time operations in an attempt to reduce their losses.
As the invasion enters its sixth day, there have been warnings that Putin may turn to increasingly barbarous tactics to take control of Ukraine.
