The court upheld the sentence of human rights activist Oleg Orlov
The Second Cassation Court of General Jurisdiction in Moscow rejected the appeal of the former co-chairman of the Memorial Human Rights Center Oleg Orlov against his sentence. He, being abroad, asked for permission to participate in the trial via video link.
The prosecutor and the court denied this right, since there are no documents confirming that Orlov was "forced out of the country by someone." The judge rejected the cassation appeal and left the sentence handed down to the human rights activist unchanged.
In February 2024, Oleg Orlov was recognized as a foreign agent. At the same time, the Golovinsky Court of Moscow sentenced him to 2.5 years in prison under the article on "repeated discrediting" the army. The human rights activist was tried for an anti-war article in which he called the Putin regime "fascist." The investigation found in the article the motive of "ideological hostility to traditional Russian spiritual, moral and patriotic values", as well as the motive of hatred towards the social group "military personnel". In August of the same year, Russia exchanged 16 political prisoners, including Orlov, for Russians serving sentences in the United States and Europe. According to him, no one asked him for consent to the exchange. When he was taken away from the pretrial detention center, nothing was explained to him. Orlov did not ask for a pardon and did not sign any documents.
