"Let's rather write a denunciation!"

Petrozavodsk artist was fined for the hope of concluding peace

- I do not want to pay this fine! - Irina Bystrova hardly restrains indignation. - I think this is absolutely unfair. All this sentence is a pure filkin letter. Soon they will begin to find fault with everything. You like it, and they will say: look, it is against our special operation, let's rather write a denunciation. And it will be endless. Like, look, 650 thousand were appointed - pays, this fine was assigned - pays. Let’s still nifigate on her. Last week, the Supreme Court of Karelia upheld the decision of the City Petrozavodsk Court, who ordered Irina Bystrov to pay 30 thousand rubles for discrediting the actions of the Russian army. About the Petrozavodsk artist, the head of the private children's art school, Irina Khresh, spoke in the spring of 2022, when pacifist statements in social networks against her were not administrative, as against many others, but immediately a criminal case. She was accused of justifying extremism and terrorism for the negative assessment of President Putin and thinking about how, in her opinion, it is worth behaving for soldiers.

Irina was then sent to a psychiatric examination, and she spent three weeks in a hospital in the Karelian village of Sailors. While the investigation was going on, the employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, according to her, were threatened by the quick term: this article provides for a punishment from 5 to 7 years in prison. The case was considered by the Moscow military court.

Irina did not admit her guilt and expected the hardest sentence. But, to surprise, the court decision turned out to be relatively soft. Nastrova received neither real nor even a conditional term.

She was returned to all seized equipment and allowed to resume teaching. Irina awarded a fine of 650 thousand rubles, which was allowed to pay in installments for five years. Karelian activists announced a fundraiser - and just in three days they raised the necessary amount. Nastrova returned to her work. Immediately after the trial, however, the number of her students decreased from 45 to 10. But gradually this situation began to improve.

And suddenly in March this year, Irina found out that she was convicted again. This time, according to an administrative article - 30 thousand rubles. I found the news of the assigned fine in the mailbox.

“Even no one in the brief, that the matter was initiated,” says Irina. - The court was not summoned. I just once found a notification in the mailbox that there was a court, and I have to pay. As the court’s decision, it was guilty of Bystrova, turned out to be that in April 2023 she expressed hope on her VKontakte page for a quick completion of a military conflict and published a photo for her friend - Ukrainian singer Zlata Ognevich with an expression of hope for a meeting after a ceasefire.

“We met Zlata Ognevich on VKontakte,” says Bystrova. - She seems to me the first to write to me. She liked the drawings of my students. And then I already looked at her page - it turned out that this is a famous Ukrainian singer. After the start of <conflict>, she stopped communicating with me. And now I wanted to turn to her in this way.

According to Irina, after her page was blocked, she created a new one under a different name. But the security forces regularly looked at this page.

And a certain policeman Malafeev read that she dreams of the termination of a special operation, and saw in this the signs of an administrative offense. Somehow Irina did not have a chance to defend myself or at least hear the argumentation of the prosecution.

She assures that she was not summoned to court, and she did not even know that the case was initiated against her. (The court’s decision, however, recorded that Bystrova was notified of the time of the meeting “properly” through the Russian Post - and simply did not appear in court.)

“I turned to a lawyer who helped me in the criminal process,” says Bystrova. - She recommended to do a linguistic examination and made an appeal. I ordered an examination. At your own expense, of course. It says that, of course, in my statements there is no insulting the army and in sight. Consideration of the appeal was scheduled for June 19. On the morning of the 19th, Irina went to court. On the way, her taxi broke. She still ran into the court building a few minutes before the meeting began, but she could not find the desired office on the move, but to tell a worried woman where she turned to, or could not, or did not want to. As a result, while Bystrova found her hall, 15 minutes have passed since the beginning of the meeting. In the hall, Irina discovered only the secretary who informed her that she was late, the judge had left, the decision was upheld.

Now Irina is waiting for a written decision of the court to file a complaint.