On March 17, these customers saw hooded men entering two establishments. They were eventually arrested for mysterious reasons.
Article written by
Posted
Reading time : 1 min.
/2023/02/26/63fb20295b7da_000-32n99rl.jpg)
Originally, there is probably a denunciation: the bar is accused of having organized a fundraiser for the benefit of the Ukrainian army, which has never been proven. But this provoked a raid by hooded FSB agents. In Russia, repression is still very present in the streets of the big Russian cities against anything that may resemble, directly or indirectly, a form of opposition to the war in Ukraine, or simply to power.
>> War in Ukraine: the UN accuses Ukrainians and Russians of “summary executions” of prisoners of war
In Moscow a week ago patrons of a bar were forced by agents of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation, or FSB, to sing the national anthem and patriotic songs before being arrested for mysterious reasons. The video of customers singing under the gaze of black-hooded men has toured the country and caused some emotion. We can also see a waitress forced to draw a “Z”, symbol of the Russian army on the door, and the officers order the customers to sing under the threat of a taser.
“They are innocent”
The song is not chosen at random: it is a title of the Lyube group, whose leader is Vladimir Putin’s favorite singer. Not really the kind of music that we usually listen to in this trendy bar in the center of Moscow, notes the lawyer for the bar owner, Konstantin Yerokhine.
“This is the first time I’ve seen this kind of performance art, if you can call it that, he quips. But the worst thing is that my clients are threatened with death today. In the street, people come up to them saying, ‘You better get out of here. You are traitors’. I think this is unacceptable because they are innocent. It was a mistake. But they really fear for their lives and I fear for their lives too.”
Clients arrested will all eventually be released. As for the bar owner, he decided to withdraw from the case after recording a video where he apologizes to the police.
View comments