Politician Leonid Gozman detained in Moscow for ‘equating USSR and Nazi Germany’ in Facebook post

Politician Leonid Gozman has been detained in Moscow over a Facebook post, Yulia Tregubova, an attorney working for OVD-Info, a Russian human rights organisation that monitors political arrests, says.

Gozman is accused of equating the actions of the USSR and Nazi Germany. He will spend the night at the police station.

The Facebook post in question reads: “Hitler is the absolute evil, but Stalin is worse. The SS are criminals, but the NKVD [the Soviet police and secret police] are worse, because they murdered their own. Hitler declared a war on mankind. The communists declared total war on their own people.”

Gozman told SOTA that the police approached him near a hospital. He refused to go to the police station, saying that he had no ID on him and that he needed to go back to the clinic to see a doctor. A policeman escorted him to the hospital, but later left the building. Gozman contacted his attorney, waited for her and then travelled to the police station.

On 25 July, Gozman was placed on Russia’s wanted list. He was detained in the Moscow metro on the same day and later released. The politician faces up to 400 hours’ community service, a 200,000-ruble (€3,300) fine, or a fine equal to his annual income for failing to notify the Russian official bodies of his second citizenship. The politician later stated that his wife had also been charged under the same article.