12 Years for Hating War

Anna Arkhipova was an ordinary young woman living in Siberia’s Novosibirsk with her cat and studying marketing. Like many students in Russia, she went through an activist phase, participating in a movement called Vesna. Vesna was created by young pro-democracy Russians in 2013 and led by several politicians in St. Petersburg. It existed as a nationwide political movement, holding pickets and sometimes playful, theatrical, and strictly peaceful, political protests. When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Vesna held anti-war actions and spoke out against the war. Arkhipova by then was no longer a member, so when Russian authorities decided to brand the movement “extremist” and ban it in 2023, she was not too worried.

However, in Putin’s Russia no person is safe from prosecution, and this spring, Arkhipova found herself convicted on four different criminal charges, including “public incitement to actions against state security,” “public dissemination of false information about Russian Armed Forces,” “participating in an extremist organisation,” and “dissemination of information about days of remembrance of military glory, expressing blatant disrespect of society.” In combination, the suitable punishment for 28-year-old Anna, according to the judge, was 12 years in a penal colony. She was one of six young Russians sentenced in the so-called ‘Spring Case’ after spending three years behind bars awaiting trial. According to prosecutors, the young defendants, along with 16 other individuals who fled Russia to escape prosecution, were plotting the overthrow of the government. Among the cited criminal evidence was Vesna’s manifesto – a list of what they felt a better Russia would look like, to include more humane prisons and increased funding for education. With zero evidence cite of any concrete plans for violence, 12 years is not just an excessively harsh punishment for what, in any European country, is simple political engagement, it is a message to all of Russia’s young people.

Like her co-defendants, Arkhipova spoke during the trial, we translate here her “Last Word”, the tradition of speaking during trial before sentencing. (Original: Pervy Otdel, Последние слова фигурантов дела «Весны»)

First of all, I would like to thank all of the participants in this trial: the prosecutors, the court, the secretary, the guards, the defense, the audience, and of course first and foremost the best “extremists” in the world. Guys, I love you so much, thank you for being with me. Thank you so much for everything.

For me, the most difficult accusation in our case is the accusation of political hatred. There is not a single person that I hate. Even those that I dislike could be counted using the fingers on one hand. This feeling is just not characteristic of me: I try to find something positive in every person, even in the worst jerk. This is the truth: I am incapable of hatred because I have learned from my youth that hate leads to suffering. Thank you Star Wars for this!

My motivation is simple – I am against war. I want a better future for Russia. All my life I have tried to make my actions consistent with my conscience, though it doesn’t always work. When the war started, conscience didn’t permit me to stay idle. People on both sides of the border deserve peace, soldiers should be with their families and not in the trenches, those who died should have lived. I mourn everyone, regardless of their uniform.

Yesterday, during the hearing, Andrey Veniaminovich [the lawyer of co-defendant Pavel Sinelnikov] said that, unlike other defendants, I cannot be drafted. Yes, this is true. But I went through military medical checks, tests of my military suitability, and probably spent more time in the military enlistment office than most of you. Ten years ago I was preparing to enter military university.

This is when I had a conversation with someone that changed my life, and perhaps led me to this place, the defendants’ bench. We had guests in our house, my mom’s friend and her husband. I was talking to this man, and he asked me where I wanted to go to university. This person, whom I known since my childhood, has always seemed quite severe to me, sometimes harsh and even rude. I told him what I intended to do, and in a blink his composure changed, and he began to cry.

It turned out that he had been in the Chechen War. He said that the bullet fired at him is still following its trajectory. He told me that, of the young men that he left home with, less than half returned home, that he had to inform their mothers about their deaths. He was practically shouting at me, saying through tears: “Are you stupid? What if there is a war? Think about your mother.” I thought then: “What war?” Well, here we are.

From that moment, I could not stand war, because I saw what it can do: a person that managed to come back home is in some way still fighting it.

The war has gone on for four years, and more than anything I want it to end. Every day, every hour I watch the news and I think “Maybe today?” But this “today” does not come, and neither does justice in our case. Perhaps even on the day when our sentence is pronounced, I will still be thinking: “What if?”

The prosecutors have asked that I be sentenced to 13 years, even calling us “convicts” by accident. It’s a great slip of the tongue that only goes to show that presumption of guilt is at work in our country, and the individual is considered a criminal from the moment of their detention. For a case that has neither victims nor damage, this is a colossal prison term.

I know people who have committed murder that received terms half of mine. I guess to criticise the regime is a much graver crime. I guess to speak out against killing is worse than committing it.

Almost three years we have been held behind bars on unfounded accusations, only because of this criticism. No material evidence of our guilt has been presented. It’s absurd: I am put on trial, but nobody knows for what.

It is so dismal that you don’t know whether to laugh or to cry. Our case is a complete projection. We spoke out against arrests for alleged extremism – so we were judged extremist. We spoke out in defense of memory of war veterans – so we were deemed disrespectful towards them. We promoted non-violence – so that means we were planning a violent overthrow of the regime.

I would like to believe that this court will put things in order and carry out a just verdict, so innocent people can once again regain their freedom. However, as one of the defendants had said, in the end it doesn’t matter what really happened, it matters what the investigator wrote down.

I am convinced that if not now, then in the future, our innocence will be proven in full. Thank you for everything.