Lawyers of human rights group "Agora" sent eight complaints on fines to activists from Smolensk, Vologda, Kotlas, Bryansk, Karelia, and other regions to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). On September 13, the head of "Agora" Pavel Chikov reported this in his Telegram-channel.
The package of complaints included appeals of activists, who were fined under the article for blatant disrespect to authorities, from eight regions:
- Karelia (Kalevala) - Roman Vatanen, he published pictures about President Vladimir Putin and the State Duma;
- Bryansk - Alyona Chervyakova, she was fined for dancing on The Hill of Immortality, a video of which she posted on Instagram. This judge considered this to be disrespect of society;
- Smolensk — Sergey Komandirov, he published a picture about Putin with the inscription «This is known by everyone who is ***** №1»;
- Vologda (Verkhovazhye) - Yuri Shadrin, he wrote that Putin is not a fabulous *******, but a real one;
- Pomorye (Kotlas) — Svetlana Baksheeva, in different comments on vk.com she compared Governor Igor Orlov with different animals and verbalized Russian noun shelupon’ (rubbish) that he had used. Lawyer Stanislav Seleznev explained that the word shelupon’ would be translated into English in case of acceptance of the complaint by the judges;
- Stavropol (Izobilny) — Ivan Pakhno, he called Putin "hypocritical" and swore at the President;
- Kemerovo (Osinniki) — Ilya Putevsky, he called Putin a "coward" and compared him with a female dog.
The complaint of blogger Kyrill Poputnikov from Yaroslavl was sent to the ECHR on September 11. He published a photo of obscene inscriptions about Putin on the wall of the Administration of Ministry of Internal Affairs on Facebook.
— In any of 23 cases known to me, during which expression of extreme disrespect to President Putin was imputed, the position of the injured person was not considered, although he is not an icon and not the Constitution which opinions are impossible to learn, - lawyer Stanislav Seleznyov commented on the complaints of the fined Internet users. He also referred to the violated right of his clients to freedom of expression.
In August, a complaint of resident of Novgorod Oblast Yuri Kartyzhev, who called the President "a fabulous *********", was the first one to be sent to the ECHR.
In the spring of 2019, Senator Andrei Klishas's law, which added a paragrapgh on punishment for disrespect to authorities, society, and state symbols to article «Disorderly conduct» of the Code of Administrative Offences of the Russian Federation, came into force. After that, several dozen bloggers across the country were fined under this administrative article. They were fined mostly for 30 thousand rubles.
