As of: 07/13/2022 7:22 p.m
Actually, the Russian opposition member Yashin should have been released after 15 days of orderly detention – but now, according to the court, he has to be remanded in custody because of new allegations. He faces several years in prison.
The Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin has to be held in custody for at least two months. A Moscow court ruled that he must remain in prison until September 12. Yashin is accused of allegedly spreading false reports about Russia’s army and thus “discrediting” it. If convicted, the Kremlin critic faces up to ten years in prison.
The 39-year-old shouted in the courtroom: “Don’t be afraid of these villains! Russia will be free!” He described the allegations as politically motivated. “The case is political from cover to cover,” he said.
After that, the court decided to continue hearings behind closed doors in order “not to reveal state secrets”. According to the Moscow court, the Russian investigative committee responsible for serious crimes had previously demanded that Yashin be remanded in custody by September 12. According to the Interfax agency, Yashin’s lawyer Vadim Prokhorov announced that he would appeal.
New allegations and a house search
Yashin was one of the last vocal opponents of the Kremlin who were still at large until recently. He was actually supposed to be released from a 15-day detention on Wednesday morning for alleged resistance to state authority. Instead, due to the new allegations, investigators came to his place of residence on Tuesday evening to search his house. Before the new allegations became known, Yashin had reported in online services that he should be released on Wednesday. “Maybe they’ll let me out, maybe they won’t,” he wrote.
According to Russian news agencies, his lawyer Prokhorov said the investigation was initiated because Yashin had described “the murder of civilians in Bucha” as a “massacre” on the YouTube video platform in April. Russian units are accused of war crimes after the bodies of civilians were discovered in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv after retreating Russian soldiers.
Publicly condemned war against Ukraine
The press spokeswoman for the imprisoned opposition leader Alexei Navalny, Kira Jarmysch, wrote on Twitter that the threat of imprisonment was state punishment for Yashin’s courage not to leave Russia. Many other opposition figures have fled abroad. Yashin had decided to stay. He publicly condemned the Russian military offensive. “The real reasons for my arrest are of course political in nature,” he said when he was arrested in June. “I am an opposition, independent local MP, a critic of President Putin and an opponent of the war in Ukraine.”
Since the start of the war against Ukraine four and a half months ago, Russia has been cracking down on critics and those who think differently. The law on spreading alleged “false information” about the army criminalizes criticism of Russia’s offensive in Ukraine and was passed after the start of the operation. On the basis of this law, Moscow local politician Alexey Gorinov was sentenced to seven years in prison last week.