A fascinating video documents a spectacular act of disobedience against Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine by regular Russian residents.
Citizens can be seen cheering an opposition council member and his attorney as they watch him receive a harsh seven-year sentence for daring to oppose the military battle in the courtroom clip, which was shot in Moscow.
The first person to be sentenced to a lengthy jail term was Alexei Gorinov, 60, for disseminating “knowingly false information” about the Russian army.
He and another council member were on trial for calling for an end to the conflict in March.
He reiterated his appeal for an end to Putin’s conflict while issuing a warning of a return to the days of Stalin in court today.
He had made remarks in March that landed him in court: “I believe that all efforts of [Russian] civil society should be targeted primarily at halting the conflict and removing Russian forces from the territory of Ukraine.”
He vehemently objected to the idea of kids dying in battle.
Since then, he has been jailed, but when he was in the dock at Moscow’s Meshchansky District Court, he reiterated his opposition to the war.
One of the most spectacular manifestations of opposition by Russians throughout the war was the response of those in the packed public seats in the court, who responded by supporting Gorinov.
Armed OMON soldiers keep watch on them but are powerless to quell the demonstration.
He put up a banner that said, “Do you still need this war?” while he was being condemned inside his glass prison.
Human rights organizations worry that he will be the first of many Russians to be imprisoned for speaking out against a conflict that has claimed tens of thousands of lives on both sides.
They are charged with disseminating “false information” on the conflict.
In his closing statement, the councillor said: ‘War, whatever synonym you call it, is the last, dirtiest, vile thing, unworthy of the title of a man.’
He said: ‘I thought that Russia had exhausted its limit on wars back in the 20th century.
‘However, our present is Bucha, Irpin, and Hostomel.
‘Do these names mean something to you?
‘You, the accusers – take an interest and do not say later that you did not know anything.’
He told the court: ‘I am convinced of this: war is the fastest means of dehumanisation, when the line between good and evil is blurred.
‘War is always violence and blood, torn bodies and severed limbs.
‘It is always death. I don’t accept it and reject it.’
In his courtroom speech he mocked Putin declaring: ‘For five months, Russia has been conducting hostilities on the territory of a neighbouring state, misleadingly calling it a ‘special military operation.’
‘We are promised victory and glory.
‘Why, then, do so many of my fellow citizens feel shame and guilt? Why did many people leave Russia and continue to leave? And why did our country suddenly have so many enemies?’
He said he had a constitutional right to express his opinion which was being overturned by the jail sentence.
‘During the years of Stalinist terror, my grandfather was accused of calling for the overthrow of the Soviet system, in the creation and strengthening of which he participated in the most direct way,’ he said.
He lived to be rehabilitated half a century later.
‘I hope my recovery will take much less time,’ he said.
‘But for now, I’m here in the courtroom.
‘My criminal case is one of the first to be heard, but hundreds of such cases have been initiated in Russia against my fellow citizens who think and speak out about what is happening.’
The Russian authorities were ‘destroying families, breaking the lives of young people’.
And speaking here, I speak for all of them who have not yet been brought to justice.
He had manned the barricades when the USSR fell, supporting democracy.
‘If they had said then that in 30 years I would be tried by a criminal court for my words, for my opinion, I would not have believed it,’ he said.
‘In the meantime, I wish prudence to our government,’ he said.
‘I wish wisdom to the judges.
‘I wish steadfastness to all who are subjected to a new wave of repressions, as well as to the entire Ukrainian people.
‘For myself I wish one day to become a future Russian Ambassador to Ukraine.’
One supporter Dmitry Fyodorov, 50, programmer, said that the charges against Gorinov were ‘unlawful’.
He was a ‘kind man and a good lawyer.’
The other accused Elena Kotenochkina was tried in absentia after she left Russia.