A participant in anti-mobilization protests left Russia after being beaten and threatened

A participant in anti-war actions, Alexander Komov, left Russia after being beaten, threatened and administratively charged. He himself told OVD-Info about this.

Komov, a resident of Moscow, received his first threats in September after he published a post on his VKontakte page about a rally against mobilization.

On September 21, he went to the action against the mobilization. After that, the man began to receive threats from unknown people on his phone again, he says. In October, Komov filed a complaint with the police, but instead of searching for the men who threatened him, the police drew up a protocol on discrediting the army against the activist (Part 1, Article 20.3.3 of the Code of Administrative Offenses, a card on the court website). In addition, the police demanded that he sign a warning about the inadmissibility of violating laws and threatened the man with a criminal case.

The threats continued, so Komov left for another city. According to the man, immediately after the move, on November 24, unknown persons attacked him, and doctors then diagnosed him with a concussion. The activist suggests that the attack was organized by the security forces, since he did not publicly announce his move.

During the appeal to the police on the fact of the attack, the security forces again threatened Komov: “They said that they would open a criminal case against me and send me to the trenches, because I am a traitor to the motherland. Then they began to receive threats from the police that, they say, I was not enough.

Then, under the door of the activist’s apartment, unknown people left threatening notes three times, one of them had the text: “Your cunt is a fucking crest.”

“I realized that for the sake of fun they would either put me in jail, or kill me, or leave me crippled,” said Komov. After that, he decided to leave Russia.

• have left Russia since the start of the war with Ukraine According to various estimates, from 150,000 to 300,000 citizens . For many activists, journalists and public figures, the reason for leaving was fear of possible criminal prosecution. After the start of the “special operation”, the Russian authorities began to open criminal cases more often against those who oppose the war or are simply engaged in opposition activities. On September 21, Vladimir Putin also announced a “partial” mobilization in Russia, which provoked a new outflow of people leaving the country.