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The Moscow court rejects the Kremlin critic's appeal

2023-04-19 16:11:21, Kosova & Bota CNA
The Moscow court rejects the Kremlin critic's appeal
Kremlin critic Ilya Yashin in prison

The Moscow City Court has rejected an appeal submitted by the lawyers of jailed Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin against his sentence of eight and a half years in prison.

He was convicted in December last year on charges of spreading false information about the Russian military and the ongoing Russian occupation of Ukraine.

Yashin attended the April 19 hearing via video link from a Moscow detention center after the court rejected his request to be physically present in the courtroom.

"I fully understand that the only way for me to mitigate the punishment is to repent, ask for mercy, call black white and testify against myself and my friends. This will never happen," Yashin said before the court, and added that he had a clear conscience and that he calmly accepts his fate.

Yashin, 39, a vocal critic of the Kremlin, is one of the few opposition politicians to remain in Russia after a wave of crackdowns against supporters of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny and those who have spoken out against Russia's February invasion of Ukraine. of the year 2022.

Yashin's sentence was the harshest ever handed down in cases involving the discrediting of Russian forces, after new laws came into effect in Russia punishing those who oppose the invasion of Ukraine.

The criminal case against Yashin was initiated in July last year. The accusation against him was made after the publications he made on YouTube regarding the crimes allegedly committed by the Russian army in the Ukrainian city of Bucha.

This critic of the Kremlin has been arrested several times in the past due to his protest activities.

Yashin previously said authorities were trying to force him to leave Russia, but he refused.

After the departure of the Russian forces from Buca and Irpini, as well as other towns on the outskirts of Kiev, dead bodies of civilians were discovered in the streets of Buca. Russia denied that it had committed these crimes and said that the footage broadcast by Buca was staged by Ukraine.

Ukrainian officials estimate that around 400 civilians were found killed in Bucha and in general over 1,000 in the whole region around Kiev./ VOA





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