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Vol. 81/No. 31 August 21, 2017
Russia protest: ‘Free Ukrainian filmmaker Sentsov’
Pussy Riot Facebook page
Two members of the Russian political punk rock collective Pussy Riot
were detained Aug. 7 for organizing a protest near the penal colony in
Yakutsk, East Siberia, where Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov is
imprisoned. In what Russian authorities claimed was an “unauthorized
rally,” Pussy Riot members Maria Alyokhina and Olga Borisova placed a
“Free Sentsov” banner on a bridge visible to many residents in the area,
while setting off blue and red flares.
Sentsov, who comes from the Crimean peninsula, was outspoken in opposing
Moscow’s March 2014 annexation of the region. He was actively involved
in Euromaiden protests that toppled the Russian-backed regime of Victor
Yanukovych a year earlier and helped evacuate Ukrainian servicemen who
were blockaded in Crimea after the Russian takeover there. Russian
federal police arrested him on frame-up charges of conspiracy to commit
terror attacks. Sentsov was sentenced to 20 years in prison by a Russian
military court in August 2015.
Filmmakers and other artists around the world have continued to protest
and demand Sentsov’s freedom. His case, along with the related frame-up
and imprisonment of fellow Crimean Oleksandr Kolchenko, are “key
political issues” in Russia, Pussy Riot says on their Facebook page.
— BRIAN WILLIAMS
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