MOSCOW, February 18 (RIA Novosti) – Three members of the anti-Kremlin feminist punk group Pussy Riot said they were arrested in the Russian city of Sochi on Tuesday after arriving in the Olympic host city to record a protest video.
Nadezhda Tolokonnikova said on her Twitter account that she, Maria Alyokhina and another female Pussy Riot activist were arrested while walking around the city.
“We’re in Sochi to carry out a Pussy Riot protest. The song is called ‘Putin Will Teach You to Love the Motherland,’” she wrote.
Tolokonnikova said the three women had been accused of theft, but claimed they had simply been walking in the city at the time of their arrest. She said officers had used force to detain them.
Alexander Popkov, a lawyer who said he would be representing the women, confirmed to RIA Novosti that they had been arrested on suspicion of stealing from a hotel, and said that about 30-40 officers had been involved in their arrest.
Tolokonnikova, 24, and Alyokhina, 25, were released early from prison just two months ago under an amnesty granted by President Vladimir Putin in December.
The women had been serving two-year prison sentences on charges of hooliganism motivated by religious hatred for taking part in an anti-Kremlin protest staged by Pussy Riot in Moscow’s main cathedral in 2012.
Following their release from prison, Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina said they were planning to distance themselves from radical political activism and focus on a new project, called Zona Prava, to campaign for prisoners’ rights in Russia.
Sochi, a resort city on the coast of the Black Sea, is currently hosting the 2014 Winter Olympic Games, which are sheduled to close February 23.
Corrects lede to clarify that the arrest took place on Tuesday, not Monday.
No comments :
Post a Comment