The Russian painter and activist Alexandra Skochilenko was sentenced this Thursday to seven years in prison for replacing price labels in a supermarket with pacifist slogans.
A court in St. Petersburg convicted Skochilenko of “spreading false information” about the actions of the Russian Army in Ukraine.
“My criminal case is so strange and laughable that sometimes it seems to me that when I enter the courtroom suddenly confetti will fall on me and everyone will shout that it was a joke,” the defendant said as she took the last word, according to collects the Mediazona portal.
The Prosecutor’s Office asked for Skochilenko, recognized as a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International (AI), eight years in prison for replacing the price labels in a supermarket in Saint Petersburg in March 2022.
For the last year and a half, the painter, 33 years old, has been in preventive detention and, as she has stated, even those who support the war have told her that she did not deserve to go to jail.
Addressing the court, Skochilenko stressed that a terrorist or extremist is not on trial.
“Not even a political activist. A pacifist is being judged,” added the artist, who suffers from various chronic health problems.
After learning of the conviction, AI released a statement in which it described the sentence as “unjust.”
“This clearly unjust verdict puts an end to a case in which the only crimes were committed by those who went unpunished, representatives of the Russian State,” he denounced.