Dozens of Russian journalists and rights activists on Monday called on the authorities to free a prominent opposition politician facing up to 25 years in jail for alleged treason and other charges which they said were politically motivated.
The appeal to release Vladimir Kara-Murza, 41, came ahead of a court hearing in Moscow as his trial, which the journalists likened to the political terror meted out by Soviet leader Josef Stalin in the 1930s, draws to a close. Kara-Murza has spent years in opposition to President Vladimir Putin and has lobbied foreign governments and institutions to sanction Russia and individual Russians for purported human rights violations.
Prosecutors accuse him of discrediting the Russian military and treason among other charges after he criticized Russia's war in Ukraine—which it calls a "special military operation"—Moscow's crackdown on dissent, and Putin. Shortly after sending tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in February last year, Russia introduced sweeping wartime censorship laws which have been used to silence dissenting voices across society.
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