Moscow court rejects key Russian opposition leader’s appeal of prison term
Yashin, one of the few Kremlin critics to have stayed in Russia after Putin launched the military action in Ukraine, participated by video link in Wednesday’s Moscow City Court hearing on his ultimately unsuccessful appeal
Ilya Yashin was convicted in December for spreading false information about the Russian troops, which was made a criminal offense after President Vladimir Putin sent the military into Ukraine. AP
Tallinn (Estonia): A court in Moscow on Wednesday dismissed a key Russian opposition leader’s appeal of his eight-and-a-half-year prison term for criticism of Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine.
Ilya Yashin, was convicted in December for spreading false information about the Russian troops, which was made a criminal offense after President Vladimir Putin sent the military into Ukraine.
The charges against him stemmed from a series of online posts discussing atrocities in Bucha, a town outside Ukraine’s capital where dead civilians were found in the streets and a mass grave after Russian troops withdrew.
During his trial last year, Yashin argued that a livestreamed YouTube video in which he talked about Ukrainians being killed in Bucha cited official Russian sources along with Ukrainian statements to give his audience an objective view.
“I will not renounce the truth behind bars,” he said, emphasizing that he considered it his duty to tell the truth.
Yashin, one of the few Kremlin critics to have stayed in Russia after Putin launched the military action in Ukraine, participated by video link in Wednesday’s Moscow City Court hearing on his ultimately unsuccessful appeal.
International human rights groups have denounced the sentence as a mockery of justice and called for Yashin’s immediate release.
Before his sentencing, Yashin addressed Putin directly, urging him to “immediately stop this madness, recognize that the policy on Ukraine was wrong, pull back troops from its territory and switch to a diplomatic settlement of the conflict.”
Asked at the time about the December 8 verdict, Putin replied that Yashin’s lawyers could appeal it.
The Kremlin has repeatedly used the law on discrediting the military to stifle dissent.
A Russian court on Monday convicted top opposition figure Vladimir Kara-Murza Jr. of treason for publicly denouncing Moscow’s war in Ukraine and sentenced him to 25 years in prison as part of the Kremlin’s relentless crackdown on critics of the invasion.
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