A resident of Kazan was fined 30,000 rubles under the article on "discrediting" the army. She wrote that "Putin started the war."

      The Vakhitovsky District Court of Kazan found a local resident ("Idel.Realii" knows her name, but for safety reasons, the editorial does not publish it) guilty under the article on "discrediting" the army for several comments in a Telegram channel. The court ruling from April 6 was discovered by "Idel.Realii". According to the case materials, on February 12 of last year, a resident of Kazan left several comments on a post in the Telegram channel "KazanDA | News of Kazan," dedicated to a phone conversation between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump. The woman wrote: "Putin himself started the war, in 3 years so many people have died for nothing on both sides, and now he is supposedly going to discuss ending the conflict." In response to another user's comment that the war was started "not by Putin, but by Zelensky," the woman wrote: "Who started the offensive? Who announced the beginning of the military operation? Who is destroying the male population of the country? It is useless to explain anything to those with 'cotton heads' who send their sons, brothers, husbands to die for money." According to the expert's conclusion, the second comment of the Kazan resident "contains linguistic and psychological signs of convincing the addressee of the negative nature of the goals of using the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation." The woman explained in court that she "did not want to discredit anyone, but only expressed her civic position." When sentencing, she asked to take her health condition into account. As a result, Judge Damir Gadyshin fined the Kazan resident 30,000 rubles, finding her guilty under the article on "discrediting" the army. Soon after the armed invasion of Ukraine, Russian authorities tightened legislation. In Russia, administrative and criminal cases are initiated against participants in anti-war actions under new articles on "discrediting" the Russian army and spreading "fakes" about it, including on social networks. Those accused face up to 15 years in prison. The country has effectively introduced military censorship, prohibiting the media from covering the war except from state positions. Subscribe to our channel on Telegram.