Additional Coverage:
- US deal freed a Russian prisoner whose crime was writing anti-war messages on supermarket price tags (newsbreak.com)
Alexandra Skochilenko, who was jailed in Russia for distributing anti-war flyers in a supermarket, was freed on Thursday in a significant international prisoner exchange. On this day, several well-known journalists, political rebels, and a lesser-known activist were liberated.
Skochilenko, a 33-year-old artist and musician with no prior political activism, was apprehended in April 2022 for replacing price tags at a St. Petersburg store with messages condemning the war. Notably, one message highlighted the bombing of a Mariupol art school in Ukraine, which was used as a shelter by 400 civilians, causing controversy over which side was to blame.
Another message criticized the war’s effect on inflation in Russia, a topic that led to her arrest after another shopper reported her. Charged under a stringent law prohibiting “fake news” about Russia’s military actions in Ukraine, Skochilenko faced a severe response: a seven-year prison sentence, denounced by Amnesty International as the result of a “sham trial.”
Now released, Skochilenko plans to travel to Germany, where she anticipates reuniting with her mother, currently living in Paris. Overcome with emotion, her mother expressed a longing to embrace her daughter, celebrating her long-awaited freedom.