A 19-year-old was sentenced to four years in prison for urinating while drunk on a portrait of a veteran.
A Russian court on Friday sentenced a young Russian to four years in prison for “insulting the memory” of a veteran of the Second World War, the teenager having urinated on a portrait of a veteran.
Matveï Youferov, 19, was found guilty of violating Russian law repressing the “rehabilitation of Nazism”, according to a statement posted on Telegram by the Moscow prosecutor’s office where the trial took place.
The young man who “publicly insulted the memory of the defenders of the Fatherland and humiliated the dignity of a veteran”, will have to serve his sentence in a penal colony, according to the same source.
The prosecution believes that Mr. Youferov “vandalized” a memorial to a veteran of the Second World War in the east of Moscow, where he filmed his actions and posted the video on the Internet.
Five years in prison required
According to the Mediazona news site, Matvei Yuferov urinated on the portrait decorating the memorial. He admitted the facts at trial, said he was drunk and had assured regrets his act.
The prosecutor had requested five years in prison, the maximum penalty for this type of offense.
The Soviet victory over the Nazis in 1945 occupies a central place in the Russian collective consciousness and is widely celebrated by the authorities and the population. Criticism of veterans is generally very frowned upon.
But even more, President Vladimir Putin made it a central point of Russia’s Soviet heritage, and mobilized the state apparatus to punish any attempt to denigrate the Soviet victory, even if it meant ignoring the abuses and the compromises of the Stalin regime.
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