The French newspaper Le Monde published an article revealing the way in which Russian citizens pay the fines imposed on them for their opposition to the war on Ukraine and official political positions.
The newspaper spoke about the case of the activist on the "Tik Tok" platform, Mikhail, who published a video clip embarrassing a woman who supported the war on Ukraine;
Which subjected him to follow-up security and imposed on him to publish an apology, along with a fine of 15,000 rubles (240 euros).
Le Monde's article explained that Mikhail's wife resorted to the "Rostraf" initiative, which collects donations to help opponents pay the fines imposed on them because of their political positions.
The newspaper said that the team of volunteers behind "Rostrov", most of them had to leave Russia, including the initiative's coordinator Paulina, 31, who started this initiative in 2019 when her boyfriend was sentenced to pay several fines because of his political stances against the regime, as she posted an appeal on her Facebook page. To collect donations, she succeeded in collecting the required amount, which was 60 thousand rubles (about 960 euros).
After the initiative was created, the first to benefit from it was a pensioner who was sentenced to pay 70,000 rubles (1,123 euros) for expressing an anti-authoritarian stance.
Le Monde's article made it clear that "Rostraf"'s activities are completely legal, as its site only publishes information on the cases it receives, so people - including major media organizations - share it and only accept donations within the Russian territory to avoid legal follow-up.
According to the French newspaper, Moscow City Council member Alexei Gorenov was the person who was convicted of the harshest sentence imposed on opponents of the war on Ukraine so far, as he was sentenced to 7 years in prison after speaking publicly about the war and the Ukrainian children killed by Russian forces.