A librarian in Moscow who claims to have been framed has been convicted of circulating extremist literature written by Ukrainian nationalists.
Natalya Sharina, former director of the city’s Library of Ukrainian Literature, was found guilty of inciting xenophobia and given a four-year suspended sentence yesterday by Meshchansky district court.
Amnesty International condemned the conviction, saying that the prosecution exploited a highly charged anti-Ukrainian atmosphere in Russia.
“The court simply dismissed key evidence for the defence, including testimonies that police officers were seen planting the banned books at the library,” said Denis Krivosheev, deputy director of Amnesty’s Europe and Central Asia division.
Ms Sharina, 59, said after the verdict that it was a political case. She added: “I worked as a librarian for 35 years. Clearly, the destruction of the library was in someone’s favour. There were no extremist books in the library. Sixteen extremist books were planted on me.” Her lawyers said they would appeal against the verdict. She was also found guilty yesterday of embezzling government funds.
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The prosecution related in part to work by Dmytro Korchynsky, a Ukrainian activist whose book War in the Crowd was designated extremist in Russia four years ago..
Ms Sharina was charged in 2015, a year after Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula and started supporting pro-Moscow separatists fighting Ukrainian government troops. She was also found guilty of embezzling government funds.
During the trial, prosecutors made clear that they saw the case in the light of the armed conflict in eastern Ukraine, where they said government forces were “destroying the Russian population”. Mr Korchynsky has served in a volunteer Ukrainian battalion fighting in the region.
Ms Sharina told the court that the library did not have the authority to censor legally published books, and anyone seeking his work could find it easily online.
Her lawyer said no proof was presented that she had disseminated extremist literature.
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Galina Yuzefovich, a prominent literary critic in Moscow, called the conviction “such a disgrace that you can’t find words to describe it”.
She wrote: “Librarians are all potential extremists, every one of them could be put away — where there’s a will, legal grounds will always be found. This is not about Ukraine, it’s about Russia. It’s about you and me, and I feel very ashamed and bad about it.”