A court in Saratov fined doctor Selimat Aslanova 30,000 rubles under the article on “discrediting” the Russian army (Article 20.3.3 of the Code of Administrative Offenses) because of a conversation in the staff room about the war. This was reported on the website of the court.
According to the case file, in September 2022, Aslanova, being among her colleagues, also uttered the phrase “I am against the war in Ukraine.”
The doctor pleaded not guilty. At the trial, she said that she did not utter the words that are attributed to her. According to her, she discussed with the resident “war in the general sense of the word – that it’s bad, because people die.” Selimat Aslanova believes that she was slandered by a colleague with whom she did not have a relationship “on the basis of national hostility”, which she allegedly showed.
In my country blocked
present tense
All witnesses confirmed that Aslanova argued with a colleague about the war, some mentioned that she also spoke out against mobilization. Only one witness “heard” from Aslanova that “Russia attacked Ukraine, the soldiers of the Russian army commit excesses, rape Ukrainian women.”
The protocol of one of the witnesses indicated that she had also heard such words. However, at the trial, she said that she “did not give such explanations, the district police officer himself filled out the protocol, and she, without reading it, signed it.”
According to Mediazona, by mid-December 2022, more than 5,500 cases were opened under the article on “discrediting”. Under the criminal article about “fakes” about the Russian army (Article 207.3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), 187 cases were opened in Russia last year. According to Pavel Chikov, the head of the human rights group “Agora”, 149 people are involved in these cases, and cases have been initiated against some of the defendants in several episodes.
