Andrei Demurenko

Colonel Andrei Vladimirovich Demurenko (born 28 April 1955) is a Russian military officer and commentator. He was the chief of staff of the United Nations Protection Force in the Sarajevo sector in 1995, during the Bosnian War, and was later the deputy director of the peacekeeping department at the Russian General Staff. Demurenko came out of retirement in 2023 to fight in the Russo-Ukrainian War, serving in the Battle of Bakhmut before being injured and removed from the front. He is the first and currently the only Russian officer to graduate from the United States Army Command and General Staff College.

Early life and career Demurenko was born on 28 April 1955 to a military family. He graduated from the Moscow Higher Combined Arms Command School and was commissioned as an officer in 1976. He also graduated from the Frunze Military Academy in 1984. He was commissioned into the motorized rifle troops, Demurenko initially served in the 20th Guards Rifle Division of the Soviet Group of Forces in Germany, and was sent to the Russian Far East after graduating from the Frunze Military Academy. While he was in the United States, in May 1993 he took part in an exercise at the National Training Center in southern California, being an assistant to the commander of the opposing force that simulated two attacks on U.S. forces. Both of them were victories for the opposing force. After returning to Russia, he was promoted to colonel. In 2012, Demurenko was the first witness called on by the defense at the trial of Radovan Karadžić by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. During his cross-examination by the prosecution he testified that his own investigation determined that the shelling that caused the Markale market massacre in Sarajevo in August 1995 was not fired from the positions held by the Army of Republika Srpska. He also testified again near the end of the trial in 2016.

At the outbreak of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, he volunteered to return to active service, but was initially rejected because of because of his old age. It took one year of working with the bureaucracy before he was accepted in February 2023. and evacuated to Moscow for treatment.

Personal life He is married and has a son and a daughter.