A man who was arrested in Russia after his child drew a picture against war – a case which made headlines around the world – has now been released from a penal settlement.
The police were notified in 2022 that Masha Moskalev, Alexei Moskalev‘s daughter, had drawn a picture with the words “No to war” (no to war) and “Glory To Ukraine”.
He was accused of criticizing the Russian army repeatedly on social media, and in March 2023 he was sentenced to two-years in prison for discrediting their army.
On Tuesday, a video was shared online showing him hugging his daughter while still wearing his prison outfit after leaving the penal colony.
Vladimir Biliyenko his lawyer at OVD-Info reported that his release was announced by the Russian human rights group.
Moskalev recalled spending two months in an isolation cell during his detention.
He said: “It’s just a torture room. Just a torture room. Do you understand that the cell was 2 metres by 1 metre?
“At first I was alone in the cell, but then they added a second person. We were both seated in a cell that measured two meters by one meter.
“The floors were rotten. Rats were everywhere. They came from the sewers, and everywhere there were huge rats.”
The Russian Federal Prison Service has not responded to Reuters’ request for comment.
The family‘s troubles began in 2022, when Masha, at the age of 12, drew an Ukrainian flag with the words “Glory To Ukraine”, rockets, and a Russian banner with the phrase “No To War!”
He said that the school had reported his daughter’s drawings to police. Moskalev was fined afterward for a social media post that was anti-war.
After his apartment was searched in December that year, he was charged with a criminal offence because he’d already been convicted for a similar offense.
Authorities separated Masha and her father, placed her in a children’s facility and then into the custody her estranged mother.
Moskalev was sentenced in March 2023 to two years imprisonment.
OVD-Info reported that he did not attend his sentence hearing after escaping house arrest and fleeing the country to Belarus.
The organisation added that he was arrested and extradited to Russia the next month.
Olga Podolskaya, a town councillor from the city of Olga, told the BBC that she was “shocked” when she spoke to them last year.
“A prison term for expressing an opinion is a terrible punishment.” Two years in prison is a nightmare.”
According to a UN report, the case is set against a backdrop of a serious deterioration in human rights in Russia following the full-scale invasion in Ukraine in February 2022.
The investigation details police violence, widespread repression against independent media and persistent efforts to silence Kremlin-critical critics by using punitive laws.
Artyom Kamardin, who was sentenced to seven years in prison for reading a poem against war in public (which authorities considered “inciting hate”) is one of the cases highlighted by the report.
The report accuses government of trying to propagate their views on the Ukraine Conflict among children by introducing mandatory school lessons that are officially labelled “important conversations”.
It adds that “Children and parents who refuse to attend such classes are subjected to pressure and harassment.”
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