A Stavropol resident has been convicted of involvement with ISIS*.

A military court in Rostov-on-Don sentenced Stavropol native Alexander Pomazanov to a lengthy prison term after pledging allegiance to the Islamic State* in prison.

Pomazanov was charged with participating in the activities of a terrorist organization (Part 2 of Article 205.5 of the Russian Criminal Code), which carries a sentence of ten to twenty years in prison.

According to the prosecution, Pomazanov decided to join ISIS* in 2023 while serving a sentence in a penal colony in Stavropol. On September 23, 2023, he swore allegiance to the leader of the terrorist organization. He sent an audio recording of the oath, made on a mobile phone, via instant messaging to certain ISIS* members, the press service of the Southern District Military Court reported on April 8.

Subsequently, on October 3 and 12, 2023, Pomazanov sent them data that, the court deemed, "may be of interest in the implementation of terrorist activities." Using Google Earth, he recorded the coordinates and images of buildings of the military unit in Stavropol, where he had previously served, and later photographed a list of the prison colony's employees.

In court, Pomazanov fully admitted his guilt and "repented of his actions," according to the YUOVS Telegram channel. The court sentenced him to 16 years in a special regime penal colony, with the first four years to be served in prison.

Alexander Pomazanov was born in June 1997 in the village of Grazhdanskoye, Mineralovodsky District, Stavropol, according to his entry in the Rosfinmonitoring register of terrorists and extremists. In its announcement of the verdict, the Stavropol Krai Prosecutor's Office identified him as a 28-year-old resident of the Mineralovodsky District, noting that he had previously been imprisoned for drug trafficking. Caucasian Knot also reported that in March, the Southern District Military Court in Rostov-on-Don sentenced Tajik citizen Alimardon Karimov to 15 years in prison on a similar charge. According to the verdict, Karimov, while serving his sentence in a Stavropol prison, also swore allegiance to ISIS* via audio message in May 2025.

* is a terrorist organization banned in Russia.

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