‘Scum and traitors’: Hostile environs for Russia’s anti-war activists
Anna Afanasyeva, a fifth-year nursing student at St. Petersburg’s Pediatric University, admits she was feeling vague anti-war emotions as she went about her business in the city center March 2. But she says she had no intention of participating in any protests.
Nevertheless, she suddenly found herself grabbed by police near the Gostiny Dvor metro station in downtown St. Petersburg, where no rally even seemed to be happening, and thrown into a police van along with several other people.
Editor’s note: This article was edited in order to conform with Russian legislation criminalizing references to Russia’s current action in Ukraine as anything other than a “special military operation.”
She spent two nights in police detention before being taken to court. A sympathetic judge considered the charge
