Press Release, 30.09.2022

Photo: Dmitry Rybakov / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service

The Supreme Court of Karelia upheld the decision of the Petrozavodsk City Court, which found Dmitry Rybakov, a deputy of the Petrozavodsk City Council from the Yabloko party and an environmental activist, guilty of “discrediting the army”. Dmitry Rybakov must pay a fine of 30,000 roubles by 28 November.

Dmitry Rybakov was fined by the city court in July for his post on his personal page on the Vkontakte social media. Rybakov state in court that the recording was made in order to show that “such actions cannot be allowed, no matter which side undertakes them”. There were no references to the “use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation” in the post.

According to indirect signs, the initiation of a case in the Public Prosecutor’s Office (which further sent the application to the police) was carried out by a deferred decision, Rybakov notes. The adoption of such a decision coincided with the voting in the City Council on the adoption of the report of the head of Petrozavodsk Vladimir Lyubarsky on his work for 2021, as well as Dmitry Rybakov’s commentary in the Petrozavodsk City Council on the speech of the head of Karelia Artur Parfenchikov.

Rybakov also notes that the documents in the case were drawn up with numerous violations. In particular, the date of the established offense in the protocol is indicated as 15 April, when the screenshots of the post on Rybakov’s page were allegedly taken. However, the post on Vkontakte was deleted by Rybakov back in March. However, neither the City Court of Petrozavodsk, nor the Supreme Court of Karelia considered such a gross violation as a reason to drop the charges against Rybakov.

Since the beginning of the “special operation” at least 30 members and supporters of Yabloko were charged with “discrediting the army”, 37 protocols of offense were drawn up against them. Three members of Yabloko are under restrictions in connection with the initiation of criminal cases on “discrediting the Armed Forces” and “fakes about the army”.

Read more about the persecution of Yabloko members after the start of the “special operation”.

DMITRY RYBAKOV

is an ecologist, a Yabloko deputy of the City Council of Petrozavodsk, Karelia, and

a member of the Yabloko Bureau.