This article was originally published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is reprinted with permission.
RFE/RL freelance correspondent Yulia Vishnevetskaya has been sentenced to five days in jail after being detained along with dozens of others by police in Daghestan, her lawyer, Aida Kasimova, announced on September 28.
Vishnevetskaya was covering an unsanctioned rally against the Kremlin’s partial military mobilization to support troop levels in the war against Ukraine.
Kasimova said Vishnevetskaya was charged with participating in an unsanctioned rally.
RFE/RL President Jamie Fly called for Vishnevetskaya’s immediate release.
“Yulia was only doing her job reporting the truth for the Russian people,” Fly said. “She should be released immediately.”
Idris Yusupov and Sergei Ainbinder, two journalists who were also held, said police confiscated mobile phones from most of the detained journalists and have been keeping them in custody without access to lawyers since.
Yusupov and Ainbinder said they were released about 17 hours after being detained.
Yusupov told RFE/RL that more than 100 men and women remain in the police custody, adding that they all were charged with administrative misdemeanors and will face court hearings.
The arrests came after hundreds rallied in Makhachkala on September 26, a day after another rally, attended mostly by women, ended with the detainment of about 120 people. Eight of the demonstrators detained on that day face criminal charges.
Protests against the partial mobilization announced by President Vladimir Putin on September 21 have taken place in several towns and cities across Russia in recent days, including Moscow and St. Petersburg.
According to OVD-Info, a human rights group that monitors political arrests in Russia, at least 2,398 people have been detained for protesting the mobilization since September 21. All public criticism of Russia’s “special military operation” is banned.
