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Agence France-Presse

A Russian court on Tuesday sentenced a blogger to five years in a penal colony for a tweet calling for attacks on the children of police, a ruling his lawyer said was unprecedented.
Vladislav Sinitsa, 30, posted the tweet in the wake of a police crackdown against protesters who have called for free elections.
“It’s an act of intimidation,” said lawyer Denis Tikhonov after a Moscow district court found Sinitsa guilty of inciting hatred.
The charges fall under Russia’s harsh anti-extremism legislation. Tikhonov said the sentence was “without precedent in its severity”.
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The ruling also comes in the context of an ongoing squeeze on internet freedoms in Russia, where social media remain among few outlets offering relative freedom of communication for the opposition.
Sinitsa, who regularly posted on Twitter under the pseudonym Max_Steklov, was detained last month over a tweet he wrote on July 31.
Sinitsa, who is from a town outside Moscow, posted about attending several opposition protests and urged others to go to them.
If you open your mouth, you’re responsible
Anna Shafran, state media journalist
In one tweet, a reply to a pro-Kremlin blogger, he imagined a situation in which people found the homes of law enforcement officers to kidnap and kill their children.
The post was picked up and reported on by pro-Kremlin media.
Russian investigators said “the criminal intent of the defendant was aimed at arousing enmity and hatred towards all law enforcement officers and their family members”.
Sinitsa’s lawyer said his client admitted to writing “this controversial post” but rejected charges of extremism.
“He said this post was not a call to anyone, it was a conversation with a political opponent,” Tikhonov said.

Opposition leader Alexei Navalny said in response to the verdict: “Sinitsa wrote a really dumb post about taking revenge on the children of police. Millions of such dumb posts are written every day.”
Navalny said he was constantly receiving such messages via social networks and called Russia “an idiot” for issuing such a verdict.
Rights lawyer Pavel Chikov wrote on Telegram messenger: “Five years in prison for words on the internet. If you really think this is OK, get ready to be next.”
But some public figures praised the verdict.
“If you open your mouth, you’re responsible,” wrote state media journalist Anna Shafran on Twitter. “If you call for killing, you’ll go down.”
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Popular historian Nikolai Svinadze, who sits on Putin’s rights council, criticised Sinitsa’s “irresponsible statement” on Echo of Moscow radio station, while calling the verdict “pretty tough.”
Sinitsa’s case was rushed through in a way his lawyer said was highly unusual and deprived him of a fair trial.
Prosecutors had asked for the maximum possible sentence of six years.
“It would have been fair to acquit him, at least not to put him in jail,” his mother told the independent channel TV Rain.
Russia has in recent years increasingly criminalised online content, frequently jailing people for sharing or publishing information deemed extremist or illegal.




The law currently forbids the sharing of content judged extremist, though rights groups say this label is also applied to opposition material.
In July a court jailed a blogger from the industrial city of Tolyatti for one year for making “public calls for terrorism” with a tweet about a suicide bomb attack on the offices of the FSB security agency.
In 2017, a video blogger was convicted of inciting hatred against believers by posting videos showing him chasing Pokemon in a church, but received only a suspended sentence.
Also on Tuesday, a court sentenced an opposition protester to three years in prison after he pleaded guilty to attacking a policeman.


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Russia

Russian blogger sentenced to five years in a penal colony over an ‘extremist’ tweet

Vladislav Sinitsa, 30, posted the tweet in the wake of a police crackdown against protesters who have called for free elections. Photo: AFP

TOPSHOT - Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny speaks to journalists as he leaves the detention centre in Moscow on August 23, 2019. - Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny was released on August 23, 2019, after serving 30 days in jail for urging protests against the exclusion of opposition candidates from upcoming elections in Moscow, his spokeswoman said. (Photo by Vasily MAXIMOV / AFP)

Russia denies role in ‘execution’ of Georgian former special forces operative in Berlin

Russian President Vladimir Putin. Photo: AP

One-man protests in Moscow as Russian opposition demands fair elections

In a move to circumvent restrictions by the authorities, activists took turns to hold protest signs as such demonstrations do not technically need approval. Photo: Reuters

People dance as the communist party supporters wave red flags during a protest in the center of Moscow, Russia, Saturday, Aug. 17, 2019. People rallied Saturday against the exclusion of some city council candidates from Moscow's upcoming election. (AP Photo)

Russian Communist Party members and supporters attend a protest rally against the exclusion of some city council candidates from Moscow's upcoming election in central Moscow on August 17, 2019. - Moscow was set for fresh protests on August 17, the latest in a wave of demonstrations that has seen tens of thousands take to the streets after opposition figures were banned from local elections a month ago. (Photo by Kirill KUDRYAVTSEV / AFP)

Communist party supporters wave red flags during a protest in the center of Moscow, Russia, Saturday, Aug. 17, 2019. People rallied Saturday against the exclusion of some city council candidates from Moscow's upcoming election. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

People rallied against the exclusion of some city council candidates from Moscow's upcoming election. Photo: AP

President Vladimir Putin bans Russian flights to crisis-hit Georgia in wake of violent clashes

Russian President Vladimir Putin chairs Russia’s Security Council meeting at the Kremlin in Moscow. Photo: EPA-EFE

epaselect epa07662944 Protestors clash with riot police during a mass rally in front of the Parliament building in Tbilisi, Georgia, 20 June 2019 (issued 21 June 2019). Thousands of protesters, amid widespread public anger, attempted to storm Georgia's Parliament on 20 June evening during a mass rally against a visit and speech inside the chamber by Sergei Gavrilov, member of the Russian lower house of parliament. Tensions escalated when Gavrilov addressed an assembly of MPs from Orthodox Christian countries from the speaker seat, media reported. Violent clashes left 39 police officers and 30 protesters in hospital with injuries, media added. Russia and Georgia have not had diplomatic relations since 2008 over the Abkhazia and South Ossetia conflict. EPA-EFE/STRINGER

epa07664107 Deputy of Russia's State Duma Sergei Gavrilov (R) attends a session of Inter-Parliamentary Assembly on Orthodoxy in Tbilisi, Georgia, 20 June 2019 (issued 21 JUne 2019). Gavrilov sat in the chair of the Georgian Parliament's speaker, what caused mass protests of opposition and followed riots. Thousands of protesters, amid widespread public anger, attempted to storm Georgia's Parliament on 20 June evening during a mass rally against a visit and speech inside the chamber by Sergei Gavrilov, member of the Russian lower house of parliament. Tensions escalated when Gavrilov addressed an assembly of MPs from Orthodox Christian countries from the speaker's seat, media reported. Violent clashes left 39 police officers and 30 protesters in hospital with injuries, media added. Russia and Georgia have not had diplomatic relations since 2008 over the Abkhazia and South Ossetia conflict. EPA-EFE/STRINGER

epa07662950 Protestors clash with riot police during a mass rally in front of the Parliament building in Tbilisi, Georgia, 20 June 2019 (issued 21 June 2019). Thousands of protesters, amid widespread public anger, attempted to storm Georgia's Parliament on 20 June evening during a mass rally against a visit and speech inside the chamber by Sergei Gavrilov, member of the Russian lower house of parliament. Tensions escalated when Gavrilov addressed an assembly of MPs from Orthodox Christian countries from the speaker seat, media reported. Violent clashes left 39 police officers and 30 protesters in hospital with injuries, media added. Russia and Georgia have not had diplomatic relations since 2008 over the Abkhazia and South Ossetia conflict. EPA-EFE/STRINGER

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Vladislav Sinitsa, 30, posted the tweet in the wake of a police crackdown against protesters who have called for free elections
In it he imagined a situation in which people found the homes of law enforcement officers to kidnap and kill their children



Vladislav Sinitsa, 30, posted the tweet in the wake of a police crackdown against protesters who have called for free elections.
