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The Primorsky Krai Court has found Marina Zheleznyakova guilty of rehabilitating Nazism (subparagraph v, part 2, Article 354.1 of the Criminal Code).
As reported by the press service of the regional courts, the case was heard by a jury—they considered Zheleznyakova deserving of leniency. Three out of eight jurors insisted on her innocence.
The prosecution was prompted by a 2021 post. In it, the politician congratulated supporters on Victory Day, called for ensuring fascism would not be allowed to rise in Russia in memory of those who died, and also wrote:
“We understand that in many ways the responsibility for starting the war and the enormous casualties lies with the communist, totalitarian regime!”
Because of this sentence, Zheleznyakova was accused of spreading knowingly false information about the USSR’s actions during the Second World War.
SOTAvision writes that in court, the politician did not agree with the accusation:
“Look at my post as a human! Where, in my post, is there denial of this fact? After all, I write ‘congratulations on this bright holiday! ’ ‘Happy Victory Day! ,’ ‘Eternal memory to the fallen! ’ Where in my post does it say I approve of crimes established by court verdict? Where do I deny the punishment of criminals? Where do I deny that Germany started the war? In which sentence did I deny crimes against humanity?”
During the investigation, she insisted that her criticism was not of the USSR as a whole, but of the “communist regime,” since “the communist party imposed its decisions on the country’s leadership.”