Translated material
May there never be sunshine
How Mayakovsky's poems, children's songs, old pictures and an asthma attack turn into a reason for arrest
Photo: Evgenia Yablonskaya / Kommersant
A resident of the Urals was fined for a picket with a quote from Mayakovsky and a line from a children's song about the sun. A seamstress from Kemerovo - for the anime video and rainbow collage posted ten years ago. An activist - for transferring 993 rubles to a project retroactively recognized as “extremist”. A pensioner with asthma is sent to a pre-trial detention center for failure to appear in court due to an attack, deprived of medication. The teenager was accused of “failing to report” a crime that did not happen. A restaurant is fined for having khinkali instead of domes on its advertising leaflet...
All these stories are united by one absurd principle: what is punished is not harm, not violence or intent, but the slightest deviation from the idea of the norm of “party politics” - be it classical poetry, an old picture or a suit. This is the last issue of the past year - “Chronicles of Current Repressions”.
"Discredit"
The Verkh-Isetsky Court of Yekaterinburg fined Kirovgrad resident Dmitry Rykov 49 thousand rubles under the article on “discrediting” the army (Part 1 of Article 20.3.3 of the Code of Administrative Offenses) for a poster with a quote from the poems of Vladimir Mayakovsky, SOTAvision* reported.
Rykov went out with a picket in the center of the Ural capital on December 7. He stood on the 1905 square and held in his hands a poster with a fragment from the middle of Mayakovsky’s work “Down! Western brothers." The activist did not admit his guilt. According to him, he spoke out “not against a specific ***, but any ***.” He also added that he does not understand how the army can be discredited.
On the weekend of December 13-14, Rykov went out on the picket again, this time with a quote from the song “Let there always be sunshine.” For this, a new protocol was drawn up against him to “discredit” the army.
* * *
The Leninsky District Court of St. Petersburg imposed a fine of 30 thousand rubles on Kazakh citizen Nurlan Akinzhanov because of pacifist slogans on the air of the Shock radio station.
Akinzhanov burst into the editorial office on the evening of Sunday, November 30, when there was an interview with the editor of the Z-book publishing house “Veche” Gleb Stafeev. According to Stafeev, Nurlan knocked on their door during a musical break: “At first he was aggressive: he jumped in sharply, hit the presenter, sat down and declared that he was going to blow up now. As it turned out, it was a bluff, but at that moment I didn’t know it. Having said everything he wanted, he surrendered to the police.”
Fontanka writes that on October 15, Akinzhanov was already detained at the Piter FM office, and before that, security did not allow the man into the building of another radio station. According to the Piter FM version, Akinzhanov “came in under the guise of a courier” and “behaved aggressively,” and there were zip ties in his backpack. He told the police that he wanted to say “a well-known pacifist slogan” on air.
Anti-Torture case**
The Leninsky District Court of Yekaterinburg sent Ksenia Garina, who had previously been arrested in the case of the Anti-Torture project, to a pre-trial detention center, who wrote about the abuse of prisoners. This was reported by the Siberian Express publication.
28-year-old Garina from the city of Tulun, Irkutsk region, who has a young son, has been in custody since the fall of 2024 as part of the Anti-Torture case. Yesterday, after the end of her arrest, she was detained at the exit from pre-trial detention center No. 5 in Yekaterinburg.
The reason was the initiation of a new case for “financing extremist activities” due to the transfer of 993 rubles to the founder of “Anti-Torture” Roman Rugevich in the fall of 2022 - two years before the initiation of the first case.
Garina herself, according to her, did not directly participate in the work of the project, but only corrected spelling and grammatical errors in several texts at the request of Rugevich (he himself said in 2023 that he received refugee status in France).
Garina was accused of participating in an extremist community (Part 2 of Article 282.1 of the Criminal Code), as well as inciting prisoners to disorganize the work of the colony and attacks on “activists” collaborating with the administrations of the colonies.
Fine for taking a photo with khinkali
The manager of the Georgian restaurant “Nino-Vano” was fined 150 thousand rubles for the establishment’s advertising leaflets depicting St. Basil’s Cathedral, which had khinkali instead of domes. He was found guilty of desecration of an object of religious veneration (Part 2 of Article 5.26 of the Administrative Code).
One of the restaurant’s visitors, Natalya Sukhovey, complained about these advertising leaflets, writes 1743.ru. After this, the prosecutor’s office conducted an investigation and interviewed a lawyer from the local diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church, who insisted that the image on the leaflets “is a direct desecration of a shrine.”
A representative of the restaurant at the meeting said that the complaining visitor was initially dissatisfied with the service in the establishment, and not with the leaflets: “On September 1, such a large, voluminous review appeared on the social network that Natalya Sukhovey did not like the service in the restaurant: she was served dishes with a delay; she wanted to take advantage of the promotion, but the waiter said that the promotion does not work on a holiday, and so on. In this review there is not a single word about the leaflets that allegedly offended the feelings of the believing family.”
After an asthma attack - in a pre-trial detention center
Alexander Titov, a 65-year-old resident of the Leningrad region, had his preventive measure tightened and sent to a pre-trial detention center after he was unable to attend a hearing due to an asthma attack, the defendant’s wife told OVD-Info*.
Titov is accused of justifying terrorism (Part 2 of Article 205.2 of the Criminal Code) due to comments in a chat associated with the Ukrainian Azov regiment***. While the investigation was ongoing, the pensioner was prohibited from certain actions. On October 21, the 1st Western District Military Court was supposed to begin considering the case on the merits, but Titov did not come to the hearing.
“It’s hard to overcome an attack; there’s a fear of dying,” noted the pensioner’s wife. “When he was able, he was the first to notify the lawyer and call an ambulance.”
It follows from the certificate that the ambulance arrived the next day and diagnosed Titov with encephalopathy. Nevertheless, on November 6, judge Evgeny Lazarev tightened his preventive measure and sent him to a pre-trial detention center, although he had not violated restrictive measures for a year, and the prosecutor’s office asked to place Titov under house arrest.
Titov requires regular treatment for bronchial asthma and medical supervision due to signs of encephalopathy. However, after a month in the pre-trial detention center, the doctor never came to see him.
The pensioner has been in isolation for a month now without vital medications and without an inhaler, which the court confiscated during his arrest. It has not yet been possible to transfer the drugs to the family. According to his wife, the doctor in the pre-trial detention center has not visited Titov since November 6, despite daily written requests.
Didn't tell me where to go
In Tyumen, a criminal case was opened against a 17-year-old teenager for failure to report preparation for a crime (Article 205.6 of the Criminal Code), reports the Central Interregional Investigation Department for Transport of the UK.
Security officials claim that in December 2024, the guy, while communicating on social networks, learned that his acquaintance was going to start an arson on the Utyashevo-Tyumen railway section together with an “accomplice.” The Investigative Committee indicated that the young people were preparing to start the arson “at the direction of an attacker acting in the interests of Ukraine.”
Residents of the Tyumen region were detained by FSB officers on the way to the stage, so they did not have time to set fire to the equipment. Judging by the release of the Investigative Committee, a case of terrorism has been opened against them, and it has already been sent to court for consideration. Investigators added that they are also investigating the case “in relation to the curator.” It is not specified under which article.
The Ural prosecutor's office reported that teenagers, 15 and 16 years old, are also accused in the case of preparing for a terrorist attack. The security forces claim that before the planned arson they “examined” the section: they found relay cabinets and video cameras, and “approach and escape” routes. The students sent photos from the site to their “curator.”
LGBT ban**
In Ulyanovsk, three people accused of organizing drag parties were placed under house arrest, regional departments of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Russian National Guard reported.
One of them, a 30-year-old Ulyanovsk resident, is accused of organizing a branch of the “international LGBT movement” (Part 1 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code), and the other two are accused of participating in it (Part 2 of Article 282.2 of the Criminal Code).
“From January [2024] to December [2025], in a hookah bar in the Leninsky district [of Ulyanovsk], owned by one of the defendants, a 35-year-old citizen, the accomplices organized and held various kinds of events where they popularized non-traditional intimate relationships and preferences,” the Ministry of Internal Affairs claims.
In the video from the search in the apartments of Ulyanovsk residents, security forces show their dresses for performances, heels and cosmetics. One of them had a sewing machine in the frame.
The city publication 73online.ru, citing sources, published details from which it was possible to identify the two men. One of them is Russian Railways conductor 30-year-old Ilya N. And his 30-year-old friend, director of the supermarket Alexander Sh. 73online.ru notes that six more of their acquaintances were interrogated in the case of an extremist organization in the status of witnesses.
* * *
The Circassian City Court sentenced a man to two years and six months in prison on charges of participation in the activities of an extremist organization.
According to the security forces, the resident of the republic was “a supporter of the international public movement “LGBT” and in the spring of 2024 he joined a group chat on Telegram created by a person from North Ossetia. The accused posted comments there that “had psychological signs of promoting non-traditional sexual relationships,” as well as ideas of “permissiveness and immorality.” These comments and ideas, as the court said in the release, “do not correspond to the spiritual and moral values of Russian society.”
The man admitted his guilt. In addition to the main punishment, the accused was prohibited from posting materials on the Internet for two years.
* * *
In Kemerovo, 28-year-old seamstress Alisa Suvorova was fined a total of 51 thousand rubles under protocols on public display of paraphernalia of a banned organization (Article 20.3 of the Administrative Code) and “LGBT propaganda” (Part 3 of Article 6.21 of the Administrative Code). The girl told Mediazona about this*.
The first fine is one thousand rubles for “photo images in the shape of a heart, inside of which there are stripes of various colors, containing the symbols of the extremist organization “LGBT”. According to Suvorova, we are talking about a photo collage that she added to her page on VKontakte in 2014 - the picture was preserved in the album “Photos from the Wall.”
The second protocol was drawn up due to a comic video with characters from various anime, cartoons and games: “Naruto”, “Samurai Champloo”, “Fullmetal Alchemist” and others. Suvorova added a video called “The World through the Eyes of Yaoischits” to her “video recordings” section back in 2013.
On December 10, the magistrate of court district No. 5 of the Central District of Kemerovo imposed a fine of 50 thousand rubles on Suvorova in the case of “LGBT propaganda.”
In the video for which Suvorov was fined, the security forces saw not only “propaganda of non-traditional relationships”, but also “propaganda of gender reassignment,” she quotes one of the policemen.
* * *
The Zarechensky District Court of Tula imposed a fine of 1,000 rubles on Matvey Milyaev for an image of the LGBT flag that he published when he was 14 years old.
He himself did not admit guilt. Although he confirmed that the page belonged to him, he stated that he did not know how the mentioned image ended up on it. His defense lawyer drew the court’s attention to the fact that at the time of the alleged commission of the offense, in 2018, the defendant was 14 years old, that is, he was a minor.
The court did not consider this argument important, pointing out that the offense was of a continuing nature, and what was important was that an employee of Center “E” was able to detect it in 2025. Milyaev received a fine of one thousand rubles. And half an hour after that - another fine for the same amount, but for publishing an image with Nazi symbols, committed in 2019. At that time the guy was 15 years old.
The case of the Altai activist
A resident of Gorno-Altaisk , Aruna Arna, accused of justifying terrorism (Part 2 of Article 205.2 of the Criminal Code), became ill in a pre-trial detention center. This was told by the activist’s mother, who believes that she had an attack “against the background of dystonia and heart failure.” Her video message appeared in the telegram channel “Voice of Altai. Voice of Russia".
Arna was examined by a doctor and prescribed medication, which she has already started taking. The activist's mother demanded the release of her daughter. She recalled that her daughter has three children and the youngest child is breastfed.
The activist has been in jail for more than two months. Initially, she was given a ban on certain activities, but then the measure was tightened, accusing her of violating the restrictions. According to Arn, the reason for criminal prosecution was her posts with the songs “Varshavyanka” and “International”.