Since the war of aggression against Ukraine, the Russian government has been taking even tougher action against critical voices. This sometimes leads to skewed court decisions. How weird shows a fine for a dream from the Ukrainian president.
After a man from Russia publicly reported a dream about Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a Russian court sentenced him to a fine. Ivan Losev from Tchita in Siberia has to pay 30,000 rubles, which is the equivalent of around 450 euros, Russian media reports. The reason: discrediting of the Russian army.
In the dream, Lossev is said to have been drafted into the Ukraine front as part of the mobilization ordered by Vladimir Putin and ended up in a training camp, he wrote on Instagram. He further describes the content of his dream as follows: “At that moment, Zelenskyj passed me and said: ‘Oh, I saw your Instagram stories. Glory to Ukraine!’ And I answer: ‘Glory to the heroes!'”
Lossev told the Sibir.Realii internet portal in an interview that he was stunned that he was sentenced for these lines: “I can’t imagine it: some 40-year-old secret service agent sat there with a straight face and my story about it copied how Selenskyj appeared to me in a dream?!”
According to Lossew himself, he was unable to take part in the court hearing against him – because he was not informed in good time about the start of the trial. The authorities investigated Lossev because of various Instagram posts, including one about the dream in question. Since the war of aggression against Ukraine, Russian courts have been dealing with criticism with considerable severity. There have already been some fines and arrests.
