This is a nonexistent fence. One of the most astonishing fences in Russia: the thing is, it doesn’t exist, and yet it keeps sending people to prison. It’s the fence around the dacha of Krasnodar Governor Tkachev, a regular subject of my blog, the very same one whose niece became a billionaire at 22. So, Tkachev illegally put up this fence around his dacha on the Black Sea coast.
When environmental activists filed a complaint with the prosecutor’s office, it was the prosecutor’s office itself that told them the fence did not exist. Well, if the fence doesn’t exist, then surely you can’t write a truthful description of Governor Tkachev on it either? You know, that famous “Sanya is a thief” (“Sanya” is a familiar form of Alexander). But it turns out that the governor’s nonexistent fence is guarded even more fiercely than any real one. A criminal case was opened over “damage to property.” This case, which everyone openly laughed at, nevertheless forced environmental activist Suren Gazaryan into political exile, while environmental activist Yevgeny Vitishko was given a three-year suspended sentence. And now, on the very day Khodorkovsky was released, the Krasnodar authorities finally decided to throw Vitishko in prison, converting his suspended sentence into a real one on the pretext that he was one day late checking in with the penal inspection office.
I myself, as someone serving a suspended sentence, currently have to report to this kind of inspection office twice a month. It’s just a formality—you come in, sign, and leave. Even so, with this ruling now hanging over him, Vitishko’s wife has to care for their two underage children alone (the judge noted that her salary of 25,000 rubles was entirely sufficient for that). The whole case is described here in detail, but also very clearly and simply. Please read it. Information about Vitishko absolutely must be spread as widely as possible. Obviously, every case involving a political prisoner here is outrageous, but this one goes beyond even that level of absurdity. These ghouls build themselves dachas with income from who-knows-where, surround them with illegal fences, and then when someone spray-paints “thief” on that fence, they send a person to prison for three years.
Freedom for Yevgeny Vitishko. You can find out about support actions taking place across the country on the blogs of Oleg Kozyrev, Suren Gazaryan, and Zhenya Chirikova.