Mathematician and graduate student of Moscow State University Azat Miftakhov, who served time on charges of hooliganism due to a broken window in the United Russia office, was detained at the exit from IK-17 in Omutninsk, Kirov Region. This was reported by DOXA with reference to those meeting.
According to them, Miftakhov was taken by car to Kirov, where a preventive measure will be chosen for him in a new case of “justification of terrorism” (Part 1 of Article 205.2 of the Criminal Code).
A new criminal case against Azat Miftakhov became known on August 25. According to Mediazona, the reason for the case was his comments while watching a TV show with other prisoners. It is unknown what the prisoners watched on TV and what exactly Miftakhov said.
Azat Miftakhov has already been interrogated as a suspect. He refused to testify, taking advantage of Article 51 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, which allows him not to testify against himself. Prior to this, Rosfinmonitoring included him in the list of “terrorists and extremists.”
The window in the office of the United Russia branch in Khovrin (Moscow region) was broken by several people on January 30, 2018, and a smoke bomb was thrown inside. As a result, no one was injured; investigators estimated the damage to the office at several tens of thousands of rubles (about $650). A criminal case was first opened under the article “Vandalism” (214 of the Criminal Code). Miftakhov became accused in this case in February 2019, a year after the events in Khovrin. Then the case was reclassified under Article 213 (“Hooliganism”), and Miftakhov was sent to a pre-trial detention center.
Azat himself denied participation in this “action,” although he admitted that he shared anarchist beliefs. By the time the sentence was pronounced, the mathematician had spent almost two years in a pre-trial detention center. In January 2021, Miftakhov was sentenced to six years in a general regime colony; in April 2022, the cassation court reduced his sentence to five years and nine months. He was due to be released on September 4, 2023.
