An employee of Center “E” conducted an “operational search event” on the Instagram of a Pussy Riot participant

An employee of the Center for Countering Extremism (Center “E”), Major D. Saraev, conducted an operational-search activity “surveillance” on the page of Pussy Riot member Maria Alekhina on Instagram. This was reported by the head of the international human rights group “Agora” Pavel Chikov.

Chikov published a photograph of the act of “monitoring” of Alekhina’s page, which was drawn up by Major Saraev. Based on the results of the operational-search activity, the security officer concluded that in the activist’s profile “photo images were identified that may have signs of an offense.”

Chikov clarified that “the Code of Administrative Offenses does not provide for operational investigative measures; this cannot be accepted as evidence in a normal court, although it is becoming more and more common. This also means that all the activities of some activists are under constant police surveillance and are recorded in the operational file.”

On December 2, in Moscow, police detained Alekhina and took her to the police department. The department drew up a report on her because of her participation in an event about police fragility.

• On November 28, Alekhina, another Pussy Riot member Margarita Konovalova and artist Farhad Israfilli-Gelman held a rally against police violence. Activists tied Israfilli-Gelman, dressed in a police uniform, with tape with the inscription “Caution, fragile” to a lamppost.
• On the same day, the police detained Israfilli-Gelman, took him to the police department and drew up a protocol on participation in an uncoordinated action (Part 5 of Article 20.2 of the Administrative Code). The next day, the police detained photographer Gleb Kuznetsov. He was released with a report under the same article. On the night of December 3, another protest participant, Rita Flores, was detained , and later that day she was arrested for 20 days.