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Nationalist Igor Girkin has long criticized the Kremlin for its incompetence in waging the war in Ukraine. But he supported the subjugation of neighboring countries. Last year, Russian security forces sent him behind bars, and on Thursday a court in Moscow sentenced him to four years in prison for “calling for extremist activities.”
The trial and conviction sparked an outcry from Girkin’s supporters. According to Russian exile media, a small group of demonstrators gathered in front of the courthouse in Moscow.
Some of them held banners with Girkin’s likeness. Several people were arrested by the police, writes the Ukrainian agency Unian on the social network Telegram.
According to today’s verdict, Girkin, also known as Igor Strelkov, will serve his sentence in a general regime prison colony.
The court also banned him from managing Internet resources for three years after his release, Russian state agency TASS wrote. At the same time, she pointed out that the court gave the convict credit for the time he spent in custody, i.e. about seven months. The verdict is not yet legally binding.
Girkin previously commanded pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine. A Dutch court convicted him in absentia in 2022 for shooting down a Malaysian airliner over eastern Ukraine, killing 298 people on board.
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