Europe 1 with AFP 6:02 p.m., March 15, 2022

Russian justice tried Marina Ovsiannikova on Tuesday in Moscow, after this producer of Russian television channel brandished a sign in full live to denounce the war which is raging in Ukraine.

Found guilty of having committed an “administrative offence”, she must pay a fine of 30,000 rubles, or around 250 euros.

A Moscow court on Tuesday fined Marina Ovsiannikova, a Russian television worker who broke into a pro-Kremlin newscast to denounce the offensive in Ukraine, but did not jail her.

Convicted of having committed an "administrative offence", Marina Ovsiannikova will have to pay a fine of 30,000 rubles (about 250 euros at the current rate), according to an AFP journalist present at the hearing.

Released, however, she still faces criminal charges punishable by heavy prison sentences.

France offers its "protection" to Marina Ovsiannikova

This 40-year-old, born in Odessa in Ukraine, burst into live Monday evening on the set of one of the most watched television news in Russia, on the pro-Kremlin federal channel Pervy Kanal of which she is an employee.

She appeared behind the presenter with a sign that read "No to war. Don't believe the propaganda. They lie to you here".

This is an extremely rare scene in a country where information is strictly controlled, and all the more so since the start of the conflict.

>> READ ALSO

 - Ukraine: Macron ready to offer consular protection to a Russian who protested on television

Earlier this Tuesday, Emmanuel Macron announced that France was ready to offer its "protection" to the employee of Russian television.

“We are going to take steps to offer protection, either at the embassy or in the asylum, to your colleague,” he told reporters, adding that he would have “the opportunity during (his) next meeting with President Putin to propose this solution in a direct way".