Россия
Политические заключённые в России
1 240 задокументированных дел
Russia holds the largest documented population of political prisoners in Europe. Since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, prosecutions under Article 207.3 ('fakes' about the army) and Article 280.3 ('discrediting' the army) have driven a sustained wave of arrests of journalists, anti-war demonstrators, ordinary citizens posting on social media, and members of suppressed religious or ethnic minorities.
The Detained aggregates verified case records from the leading Russian human rights organizations — OVD-Info, Political Prisoners Support. Memorial, and Mediazona — translates them into English, and standardizes the case taxonomy so journalists, lawyers, and researchers can search by region, charge, demographic, and urgency. Cases here are sourced from public reporting; we do not generate primary documentation.
Основные источники: OVD-Info, Political Prisoners Support. Memorial, Mediazona
Yuriy Argeev was sentenced to 5.5 years in a general regime colony for leaving supportive comments about the Azov regiment on YouTube. The court interpreted his emotional well-wishes as the public justification of terrorism.
An unidentified woman from Chelyabinsk was sentenced to two years of suspended imprisonment for extremist calls. The charges stem from her posting materials that supported the 'Legion Freedom of Russia' in April 2022.
A resident of Omsk is facing a case for disseminating false information about the Russian Armed Forces. The case was brought before the court in May 2025 and is awaiting a verdict.
An unnamed minor resident of Togliatti was given a suspended sentence of two and a half years for spreading "fakes" about the Russian Armed Forces, discrediting the Armed Forces, and making calls for extremism. Further details of the case are unavailable.
An unnamed resident of Omsk was fined 350,000 rubles for publicly justifying terrorism due to a social media post praising the arson attack on a military recruiting office in Krasnoyarsk.
An unnamed male resident of Bashkortostan is on trial for public justification of terrorism for allegedly approving of a Ukrainian Armed Forces strike on Sevastopol in a Telegram channel comment. The case went to court no later than June 2025.
Roman Zubov, a resident of Feodosia, was sentenced to 2 years and 6 months in prison for calls to extremism made in a Telegram community. The charges stemmed from comments he made that allegedly called for violence against Russians based on ethnic hatred.
Igor Orzhevsky, a blogger from Moscow, faces charges for spreading false information about the Russian Armed Forces, public justification of terrorism, incitement to hatred and rehabilitation of Nazism. The case is related to his publications about the war in Ukraine and criticism of Putin; he sought political asylum in the US and was detained.
A resident of Sevastopol was prosecuted for calls to extremism. She allegedly left comments in "anti-Russian" Telegram channels calling for "violent actions of an extremist nature."
An unidentified male from Sakhalin was sentenced to five and a half years in a general regime colony for allegedly sharing pro-Ukrainian nationalist ideology and calling for armed rebellion via a messenger.
Arman Burangaziev, a farmer from the Orenburg region, was prosecuted for spreading false information about the Russian Armed Forces. He was fined 250,000 rubles on July 17, 2024.
Vitaliy Tkachenko was sentenced to two years in a general regime colony for publishing comments on Telegram calling for the destruction of Russians. His case consists of five separate episodes related to extremist activity.
420 из 1 240 дел пока не нанесены на карту — обычно потому, что в первоисточнике не указано точное местоположение.
In March 2022 Russia created two crimes that did not exist before the invasion. Almost everyone documented under them was prosecuted for online speech.
Treason was Russia's rarest political charge — two documented arrests in 2019. Since the invasion it has become an assembly line: dozens of ordinary people a year, drawing the longest sentences in our database for donations, messages and photographs.
Figures reflect documented cases in this database · a lower bound, not an official total
