A resident of the Tula region was fined for publishing an icon of Stalin

On May 12, 2021, in the city of Shchyokino, Tula Region, a justice of the peace fined a local resident, Dmitry Bukharov, 30,000 rubles for posting an image of Joseph Stalin as a saint on the VKontakte social network. This is reported by the Information and Analytical Center "Sova" with reference to the case card on the website of the court district.

The resident was accused of public desecration of objects of religious veneration (part 2 of article 5.26 of the Code of Administrative Offenses) and a fine of 30,000 rubles was imposed. Bukharov fully admitted his guilt.

“From our point of view, posting such images online should not in itself be interpreted as desecration of objects of religious veneration. If it was a collage, then the publication of collages does not imply any active actions with religious paraphernalia. If a photograph of an icon of Stalin really painted by someone was published, then the icon itself did not suffer from the publication; the statement about the holiness of Stalin belongs to the field of religious controversy and is not illegal in itself. We also note that the concept of “desecration” is not defined in the legislation in any way, ”they write on the Sova website.

• In January, a magistrate in the Proletarsky district of Tula imposed a fine of 10,000 rubles on a resident of Plavsk, considering the publication of collages of the face of Christ with a washbasin tap from the Moydodyr cartoon, icons of St. Images. The resident filed an appeal, but the regional court decided to toughen the punishment and increased the fine to 30,000 rubles.