The 1st Dnipropetrovsk Regiment for the Protection of particularly important State Objects is a regiment of the National Guard of Ukraine tasked with the protection of strategically important sites such as the PA Pivdenmash and the Dnipro Machine-Building Plant. It was established in 1991 and is currently headquartered at Dnipro although formerly a Battalion of the regiment was Garrisoned in Rubizhne as well.
Until 2015, the regiment also carried out security and defense of LLC NVP "Zorya" in Rubizhne.[3] The regiment's Rifle Company in Rubizhne was disbanded in 2015.[4] It saw action during the War in Donbass with a soldier (Oleg Mykolayovych Yakovchenko) dying as a result of wounds on 6 August 2015. Its tasks then shifted to the defense of PA Pivdenmash, the Dnipro Machine-Building Plant and other strategically important sites.[5]
On 17 January 2018, a soldier (Mansur Mansurovych Verzhakovskii) of the regiment was killed under undisclosed circumstances[6] followed by another soldier (Kiba Andrii Andriyovych) on 12 July 2019 under similarly mysterious circumstances.[6][7]
On 27 January 2022, at the PA Pivdenmash in Dnipro, a soldier of the regiment, Artemiy Ryabchuk, during the handing out of weapons, attacked his fellow guardsmen using an AK-47, the ensuing gun battle resulted in the death of four personnel of the regiment (Oleksandr Oleksandrovich Buganov, Dragan Oleksandr Oleksandrovych, Artem Volodymyrovych Levkivskyi and Chernyk Leonid Leonidovych) and a female worker at the site.[8][9][10] The resulting investigation revealed that the officers of the regiment were involved in multiple human rights violations on the conscripts serving in the regiment including physical and psychological torture.[11] As a result of this incident, the commander of national guard Mykola Balan[12][13] along with the first deputy, the chief of staff, the commander of the regiment and the deputy commander of the regiment were removed from their positions.[14]
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