On April 9, the 1st Western District Military Court in St. Petersburg received a criminal case against 47-year-old Vologda resident Anatoly Burov, accused of publicly justifying terrorism (Part 2 of Article 205.2 of the Criminal Code). Mediazona drew attention to the case file.
Anatoly Burov is a Vologda opposition activist. He participated several times in local elections to the Legislative Assembly of the region and the City Duma of Vologda, and was secretary of the Vologda City Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation.
In 2021, Burov was fined 20 thousand rubles under the article on organizing an unapproved rally (Part 2 of Article 20.2 of the Administrative Code). The Vologda City Court recognized him as the organizer of the rally in support of Alexei Navalny on January 31, 2021 in the city's Hyde Park. The activist did not admit guilt.
In May of the same year, the prosecutor's office opened an administrative case against Burov for inciting hatred or enmity (Article 20.3.1 of the Administrative Code). The reason was the inspection material that the department received from Center “E”.
Then the security forces examined the activist’s page on VKontakte and found several publications there, including: “Be afraid to wake up the Russian”, “Orient the left to the right march”, “With the bitter failure of the great victory holiday”, “The Jews occupied Russia”, “Our , Russians, ancestors, grandfathers and great-grandfathers, let them, the Zionists, onto our holy, fertile land.” The examination concluded that Burov’s publications contain a negative assessment of various groups united along ethnic lines.
In the case of justifying terrorism, the Vologda City Court arrested the activist in October last year. “The man is suspected of distributing a video through a telegram channel about the recognition of the ideology and practice of terrorism as correct, in need of support and imitation, and also containing calls for terrorist activities,” the press service said in the post. No other details were provided in the publication.
Burov's defender Oleg Surmachev also refused to tell Mediazona what exactly the activist is accused of, citing attorney-client privilege. “Don’t worry, everything is under control, I’m doing my best,” he added.
In one of his last posts on his VKontakte page, Burov wrote about the need to create a “Russian Republic” within the Russian Federation. In it, he writes that in Russia “there was a nullification of the country’s Constitution,” as well as a “nullification” of the borders recognized by the international community “due to the annexation of new regions that were previously the lands of Ukraine.”
“This raises the question, what if the special operation in Ukraine and the annexation of new territories does not bring the desired result, it will not achieve the goal of “Denazification and Demilitarization,” what then? Will the Russian people be left with nothing again?” — writes the activist.
The date of the first hearing in the case in the district military court has not yet been set, however, on April 22, Burov’s preventive measure must be extended.