A criminal case against Sergey Lukashevsky, a former director of Sakharov Centre in Moscow, was initiated in Nizhny Novgorod. The first court hearing was scheduled for May 2, 2024. Lukashevsky is charged under the article of the Criminal Code on the public spread of knowingly false information about the actions of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, allegedly “motivated by political hatred.” The evidence in the case are a few posts on his FB account in the spring 2022, where Lukashevsky condemned the military actions, which led to death and suffering of civilians. If convicted, Lukashevsky may be sentenced to up to ten years in prison. Lukashevsky left Russia and is now Editor-in-Chief of Radio Sakharov.
Criminal prosecution for “spreading fakes” was introduced in Russia shortly after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. These cases are opened against people who publicly (for example, on social media) express opinions that differ from the official statements of the Russian Ministry of Defence. Any criticism of the actions of the Russian government and the Armed Forces can be prosecuted under this Criminal Code. According to OVD-Info, a human rights group, nearly 300 such criminal cases were opened since 2022. Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin is serving an eight-year prison term for talking about the atrocities in Bucha on his YouTube channel. American-Russian journalist Masha Gessen was arrested in absentia for talking about the same topic.
Sakharov Centre in Moscow, of which Lukashevsky was director, was liquidated on the orders of the Russian Ministry of Justice in August 2023. The case against the Centre was launched due to denunciation of Andrei Lugovoy, a deputy of the State Duma, a former KGB guard, who is wanted by the British police on suspicion of poisoning Alexander Litvinenko in London with radioactive Polonium.