July 15 (Portal) – A Moscow court on Saturday filed criminal charges against seven people “motivated by national hatred” in killing two prominent Russian journalists in a Ukraine-backed plot, Russia’s state news agency TASS said.
The court authorized the detention of five minors born in 2005 and 2006 and two men until September 14 on charges of “hooliganism,” TASS said.
TASS said Russia’s FSB intelligence agency on Friday detained an unspecified number of people conducting reconnaissance near the homes and workplaces of journalists Margarita Simonyan, head of state media outlet RT, and Ksenia Sobchak, who ran against President Vladimir Putin in 2018 , had performed.
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, has said in televised speeches that Russia is living in an absurd “constructed mythology”.
When asked about the case in an interview, Podolyak downplayed its importance, saying the journalists “played no significant role” in the war or in the loss of Russia’s position on the world stage.
The Interfax news agency quoted the FSB as saying those arrested admitted preparing attacks on the two women on behalf of Ukraine and were promised a reward of 1.5 million rubles ($16,620) for each attack .
Simonyan, a vocal supporter of the Russian war in Ukraine, published a message on Telegram about the alleged conspiracy and urged the security services: “Keep working, brothers!”
Sobchak, whose late father Anatoly Sobchak was Putin’s political mentor, said if the assassination plots were true, then “I thank all the services involved for their work.”
In a post on her Telegram channel, which often contains critical reports on the Russian government’s policies, she added that if the reports are untrue and the idea is just to put me and Simonyan in one sentence, then this the usual meanness.
“In any case, I would like to report that all terror is evil, without ifs and buts,” she added.
Last year, bombings in Russia killed prominent Russian pro-war advocates, including journalist Darya Dugina and military blogger Vladlen Tatarsky. Russia blamed Ukraine for their killings, while Kiev denied it, presenting it as evidence of internal infighting in Russia.
In May, a well-known Russian nationalist writer, Zakhar Prilepin, was injured in a car bomb attack that killed his driver. Investigators said a suspect was arrested and admitted to acting on behalf of Ukraine.
Portal reporting; Adaptation by David Holmes, Christina Fincher and Diane Craft
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