Pussy Riot activists Maria Alyokhina and Lyusya Shtein jailed for ‘displaying Nazi symbols’ in years-old social media posts

Moscow’s Tverskoy District Court has jailed Pussy Riot activists Maria Alyokhina and Lyusya Shtein (a municipal deputy) for 15 days and 14 days, respectively, under the administrative article prohibiting the display of Nazi symbols.

On Friday, December 17, Alyokhina told Mediazona that the administrative charge was brought against her over a photo of Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko with swastikas, which she posted on Instagram in 2015. 

In turn, Shtein said that she was charged over a photoshopped image that showed her in an SS cap, which she posted on Facebook in 2018. In a series of tweets, Shtein explained that the image was a screenshot from a YouTube video. “This is somebody’s fan art and photoshop,” she clarified. 

Both Alyokhina and Shtein will serve their administrative arrest at a special detention center in Sakharovo, a village outside Moscow.

Lyusya Shtein was arrested on Thursday, December 16, as she was leaving home to go check in probation officers in connection with the parole-like restrictions handed down to her in the so-called “Sanitary Case.” Maria Alyokhina was arrested a few hours later.

In the summer of 2021, Russian authorities repeatedly arrested and jailed multiple Pussy Riot activists. Many of them subsequently left Russia.