A doctor accused of criticising the war in Ukraine in front of a patient has been jailed for five and a half years after being convicted of spreading false information about the Russian military.
Dr Nadezhda Buyanova, 68, was arrested in February after Anastasia Akinshina, the mother of one of her patients, reported the paediatrician to authorities.
Ms Akinshina alleged that Buyanova told her and her son that his father, a Russian soldier who was apparently killed in Ukraine, was a legitimate target for Kyiv’s troops and had blamed Moscow for the war.
The move is part of a relentless crackdown on dissent by the Kremlin.
A video of the outraged Ms Akinshina complaining about Buyanova was widely publicised, and chief of Russia’s Investigative Committee Alexander Bastrykin personally demanded that a criminal case should be brought against the doctor.
Buyanova, who was born in western Ukraine, denied the accusation, insisting she never said what she was accused of saying. In a tearful closing statement to the court last week, she called for the court to acquit her.
Her defence argued the prosecution failed to present evidence that the purported conversation took place, including any recordings of it, and alleged that her accuser fabricated the story out of animosity toward Ukrainians, according to the independent news site Mediazona.
In her closing statement to the court, Buyanova said it was “painful” to read the accusations in the indictment, and broke down.
“A doctor, especially a paediatrician, is not capable of wishing harm to a child, his mother, or traumatizing the child’s psyche. Only a monster is capable of this – and of the words that I allegedly said to them,” Mediazona quoted her as saying.
Buyanova’s case drew national attention, with more than 6,500 people signing an online petition demanding her freedom and supporters regularly attending court hearings. As the judge read out the verdict, they shouted: “Disgrace!” before bailiffs escorted everyone from the courtroom.
Her lawyer, Oscar Cherdzhyev, told reporters afterward that the verdict was “unexpectedly harsh” and “monstrously cruel”.
“We didn’t expect this,” he said.
“Spreading false information” about the army has been a criminal offence in Russia since March 2022, when the Kremlin adopted a series of laws prohibiting any public expression about the invasion that deviated from the official narrative.
Authorities started actively using them against critics and protesters.
According to OVD-Info, one of Russia’s leading rights groups that tracks political arrests, more than 1,000 people have been implicated in criminal cases on charges related to speaking or acting out against the war.
