In the Leningrad region, the court dismissed the case under the article about fakes against a Radio Liberty journalist

The Gatchina City Court of the Leningrad Region dismissed the case under the article on fakes (part 9 of article 13.15 of the Code of Administrative Offenses) against Tatyana Voltskaya, a journalist from Radio Liberty. This is reported by MBH Media with reference to the lawyer Leonid Krikun.

The case was opened because of Voltskaya's article about the lack of ventilators.

“Despite the fact that the court had the opportunity to terminate the administrative case due to the expiration of the terms for bringing to administrative responsibility, the court made a decision, evaluating the arguments of the complaint that Voltskaya had the right to express her opinion on a socially significant issue, as well as the fact that the preparation and the transfer of the article for publication was an expression of the journalist’s professional and civil position,” the lawyer quotes MBKh Media.

Krikun explained that in its decision, the court called the attempts to bring the journalist to criminal and administrative liability because of her publications as an interference with freedom of expression, enshrined in the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.

Due to the same article, following which the case against Voltskaya was terminated, in August 2020 Radio Liberty was fined 300,000 rubles.

• In December 2020, Voltskaya was fined 30,000 rubles under the article on the distribution of fake news because of the material ““People are forcibly disconnected”: a resuscitator about hellish working conditions.”
• In April 2020, the Prosecutor General's Office demanded that Voltskaya's interview about the lack of ventilators and forced euthanasia be removed.
• On April 1, 2020, Article 207.1 of the Criminal Code - “Public dissemination of knowingly false information about circumstances that pose a threat to the life and security of citizens that pose a threat to the life and security of citizens” came into force. The maximum penalty under the article is up to three years in prison.