Russia is considering introducing prison terms of up to six years for online comments

Russian authorities are preparing to toughen criminal penalties for inciting mass unrest, justifying terrorism, and committing acts of violence against government officials, particularly online.

 

This week, the Russian government submitted a bill to the State Duma containing amendments to the Criminal Code. The bill provides for increasing the punishment for the listed offenses to up to four years in prison. If these acts are committed using the internet or the media, the bill proposes introducing a separate section of the article with a maximum penalty of up to six years in prison.

As explained by lawyers interviewed by Deutsche Welle, acts currently covered by Part 3 of Article 212 of the Russian Criminal Code are classified as minor offenses. Once the maximum penalty is increased to four years, the basic offense will be reclassified as a medium-severity crime. At the same time, online calls for which up to six years in prison are proposed as punishment will be classified as serious crimes.

Yevgeny Smirnov, a lawyer with the human rights project “First Department,” described these changes as a continuation of a trend by the Russian authorities over the past 15 years—the tightening of penalties for speech. In his assessment, these legislative changes are gradually making it dangerous to discuss an ever-widening range of topics: from events that the Russian authorities classify as terrorism to the actions of Russian officials and military personnel.

Lawyer Valeria Vitoshkina drew attention to another consequence of the proposed amendments. Classifying online calls to action as serious crimes will expand the grounds for placing suspects and defendants in pretrial detention.

According to her, the current Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation allows for the application of this preventive measure against suspects in crimes of moderate severity if they were committed with the use of violence or the threat of its use, as well as in serious and particularly serious crimes.

Thus, if the bill is adopted, Russian law enforcement agencies will be able to seek the detention of individuals accused of making such calls online.

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