Dissident Oleg Orlov, a figure in the defense of human rights in Russia, was sentenced on Tuesday February 27 to two and a half years in prison by a Moscow court for repeated denunciations of the Russian military offensive in Ukraine.
“The court found Orlov guilty and imposed a sentence of two years and six months in (...) a penal colony,” the judge said in his verdict, according to an AFP journalist present at the hearing.
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As the verdict was announced, 70-year-old Oleg Orlov, wearing a sweater and thin glasses, winked at his wife Tatiana and then said: “Tania, you promised me!” , seeming to ask him not to cry.
Several dozen of his supporters came to court to support the man who was one of the last Kremlin critics not to be behind bars or in exile abroad.
“Strangulation of freedom” in Russia
Veteran of Memorial, the NGO co-winner of the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize and dissolved by Russian justice, Oleg Orlov denounced in his last speech on Monday "the strangulation of freedom" in Russia and "the entry of troops Russians in Ukraine.
“I repent of nothing and regret nothing,” he said.
He also denounced the death, on February 16, of the opponent Alexeï Navalny in his Arctic prison, which he described as "murder", and called on supporters of the Russian opposition to "not lose courage ".
At the end of a first trial, Oleg Orlov was found guilty in October 2023 of having "discredited" the army and sentenced to a small fine, a very lenient verdict in a Russia which has become accustomed to imprisoning detractors of power.
This sentence had been requested by the Prosecutor's Office but it then changed its mind and appealed.
With AFP
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