A St. Petersburg resident was fined twice under Article 20.3.1 of the Code of Administrative Offenses for anti-war posts

The reason for the fines against Ekaterina Belyankina was her posts about the responsibility of Russians.

On April 18, 2024, the Pushkinsky District Court of St. Petersburg sentenced Ekaterina Belyankina to two fines of 10 thousand rubles each under Article 20.3.1 of the Code of Administrative Offenses (incitement to hatred or enmity, as well as humiliation of human dignity).

The basis was the conclusion of an expert who found in two of Belyankina’s posts on VKontakte statements with a negative characterization of Russians as a group of people, distinguished by their nationality, language, and origin.

The first post was published on the social network on November 30, 2022. In it, Belyankina spoke out against the conduct of hostilities on the territory of Ukraine and stated: "we will bear full responsibility for this." The second post was published on May 9, 2023 and began with the words "Victory Day has turned into a holiday of weapons and militarism." The expert found signs of incitement to hatred in the fact that Belyankina wrote that "we" came to the land of Ukrainians, that only Russia is to blame for the outbreak of hostilities, as well as in the words "Happy Victory Day over fascism. But now we are the fascists...".

We believe that Belyankina was wrongfully prosecuted. Apparently, it did not contain any calls for violence or discrimination, nor any insults against ethnic Russians. It only contained discussions about the political responsibility of Russian citizens for the events that were taking place.

Ekaterina Belyankina is known as an activist of the “Observers of St. Petersburg” movement; she was a member of the city’s territorial electoral commission No. 20.

Sources

• Administrative Offence Case Card No. 5-373/2024 // Pushkinsky District Court of St. Petersburg. 2024. May 28.
• Administrative Offence Case Card No. 5-374/2024 // Pushkinsky District Court of St. Petersburg. 2024. May 28.