Ukraine war: Russian artist Sasha Skochilenko jailed for anti-war messages

A Russian anti-war activist has been sentenced to seven years in a penal colony for replacing supermarket pricing labels with anti-war messages.

Sasha Skochilenko, 33, an artist from St Petersburg, has been in detention since April last year.

She was convicted of spreading "false information" about the Russian army.

Her lawyers pleaded for her acquittal, saying that chronic illnesses she suffers from mean she is at risk of dying in prison.

Weeks after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Ms Skochilenko protested by replacing supermarket labels in a St Petersburg supermarket with anti-war messages, a small act called for by a feminist collective.

The replacement labels read: "The Russian army bombed an art school in Mariupol. Around 400 people were hiding inside," and: "My great grandfather did not fight in WWII for four years so that Russia could become a fascist state and attack Ukraine."

Ms Skochilenko admitted the charges.

In her closing statement, the artist struck a defiant tone, asking the court: "How little faith does our prosecutor have in our state and society if he thinks that our statehood and public security can be ruined by five small pieces of paper?"

"Say what you want - I was wrong, or I was brainwashed," she said. "I will stand by my opinion and my truth."

Skochilenko was convicted of "discrediting the Russian army" under repressive laws adopted in the wake of the invasion.

The legislation effectively criminalises all anti-war activism.

The trial lasted a year and a half, apparently because it was one of the first to be brought under the new laws.

"At first, the investigation took a long time. Prosecutors needed to find some evidence somewhere," said her lawyer Yana Nepovinnova.

Sasha Skochilenko's sister Anna told the BBC that her sibling was "a symbol of everything the [Russian] authorities hate".

"She is artistic, fragile, lesbian, has a Ukrainian surname," Anna Skochilenko said.

She said she was terrified that her sister's chronic health conditions meant there was a risk of her dying in prison. Skochilenko has been diagnosed with coeliac disease as well as a heart defect that causes her heart to stop beating for two to three seconds.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has overseen an unprecedented crackdown on domestic opposition in parallel with the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The laws used to convict Ms Skochilenko have been used to target scores of critics of his rule.

Last month, journalist Marina Ovsyannikova, who protested against the invasion of Ukraine live on state TV, was convicted to 8.5 years in jail in absentia.

In April, British-Russian opposition activist Vladimir Kara-Murza was sentenced to 25 years for his criticism of the war.