A Russian court has sentenced a St Petersburg artist to seven years in prison in a closely watched trial that has highlighted the severe punishments meted out to ordinary Russians for even small acts of civil protest against the invasion of Ukraine.
Aleksandra “Sasha” Skochilenko, an artist, musician and activist, was found guilty on Thursday of “knowingly spreading false information about the Russian army” in March 2022. The artist replaced five price tags in a local supermarket with pieces of paper urging shoppers to stop the war and resist propaganda on television.
“Putin has been lying to us from television screens for 20 years: the result of these lies is our readiness to justify the war and the senseless deaths,” read one of the altered price tags, which prosecutors declared dangerous to Russian society and the state.
“The Russian army bombed an art school in Mariupol. Around 400 people were hiding inside,” read another.
Skochilenko is one of hundreds of Russians to face criminal charges for their opposition to the war. Many have been charged under the law against spreading “fake” information about the military, which was hastily adopted after Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. The law carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison. Others charged have included opposition politicians, activists and journalists.
The laws have had a chilling effect on protest in Russia, where public displays of opposition to the war have virtually disappeared.
“How fragile must the prosecutor’s belief in our state and society be, if he thinks that our statehood and public safety can be brought down by five small pieces of paper?” said Skochilenko, 33, in a final statement in court on Thursday.
“Despite being behind bars, I am freer than you,” she said. “I’m not afraid to be different from others. Perhaps that’s why my state is so afraid of me and others like me and keeps me caged like a dangerous animal.”
Dozens of supporters shouted “Shame!” as a judge read out the sentence in the case. Skochilenko made the sign of a heart with her hands from the inside of a cage reserved for court defendants in Russia. Prosecutors had asked for eight years in prison.
Skochilenko, who has been declared a political prisoner by the Russian human rights group Memorial, has struggled with health problems during a 19-month pre-trial detention period. She suffers from coeliac disease, which requires a gluten-free diet; bipolar disorder and a heart condition. It appeared that prosecutors were refusing her essential medicines to put additional pressure on her.
Skochilenko was arrested after a 76-year-old shopper alerted police, an act compared to the Soviet-era practice of ordinary citizens spying for the security services.
In an interview with the Russian website Bumaga, the woman defended her decision to complain, but conceded that the eight-year prison sentence may be too harsh.
“I am the ‘informer’,” she said in the interview. “I’m proud of what I’ve done. Is it not a disgrace to see a crime and then just walk by? Did I send her to lay out these price tags? What do you want me to say, that she’s a good girl? Should she be forgiven?”
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