Oleg Gennadyevich Sentsov is a Ukrainian filmmaker, writer and activist from Crimea.
18 Facts About Oleg Sentsov
2.
Oleg Sentsov was awarded the European Parliament's Sakharov Prize in 2018.
3.
Oleg Sentsov was born on 13 July 1976 in Simferopol, Crimean Oblast, Ukrainian SSR.
4.
Oleg Sentsov has stated that he does not recognize the Russian annexation of Crimea.
5.
Oleg Sentsov was arrested on 11 May 2014 in Crimea on suspicion of "plotting terrorist acts".
6.
Russian prosecutors stated that Oleg Sentsov confessed to the terrorist plots.
7.
On 7 July 2014, Oleg Sentsov's arrest was extended to 11 October.
8.
Oleg Sentsov went on trial for terrorism in Russia on 21 July 2015 among international outcry.
9.
Oleg Sentsov initially served his sentence in the Russian federal subject Sakha Republic.
10.
In October 2016, Russia refused to extradite Oleg Sentsov to Ukraine, claiming that he was a Russian citizen.
11.
Oleg Sentsov declined visits by his family after observing that once the visitors leave other prisoners "fall into terrible deep depression".
12.
European film directors Agnieszka Holland, Ken Loach, Mike Leigh, and Pedro Almodovar co-signed a 10 June 2014 letter by the European Film Academy to Russian authorities, demanding that the charges against Oleg Sentsov be dropped and the allegations of torture investigated.
13.
Iranian film director Mohsen Makhmalbaf dedicated his acceptance of the 2015 Robert Bresson Prize at the Venice Film Festival to Oleg Sentsov, calling the conviction a "major injustice" and the sentence "a move to intimidate all Russian society, especially the intellectuals and artists".
14.
Oleg Sentsov was granted the title of honorary citizen of Paris on 24 September 2018.
15.
Oleg Sentsov was awarded the European Parliament's Sakharov Prize on 25 October 2018, in a move described by The Guardian as an EU rebuke to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
16.
On that same day he returned to Kyiv, where he and other returning prisoners were welcomed by Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky and where Oleg Sentsov reunited with his family.
17.
The film was produced while Oleg Sentsov was still in prison.
18.
Oleg Sentsov called on the international film community to boycott Russian cinema.