January 03, 2024

Student Sentenced for Spying


Student Sentenced for Spying
Notebook, book, and pen. Snufkin, StockSnap.io

On December 30, for the first time, Russia convicted a student for spying. An 18-year-old academic prodigy was accused of photographing the armed forces and sending his pictures to representatives of foreign states.

Kevin Lik stood out for his collection of academic medals. The Maykop native was a four-time winner of the local German Language Olympics and also won history and Eurasian linguistics competitions. In 2022, Lik completed a biology summer school and decorated his VKontakte with pictures of flowers and plants from the Caucasic mountains. A friend of Lik's told the BBC that the academic prodigy's mother had sent him to Moscow for a better education in 2022. 

The court's verdict said that Lik was against the invasion of Ukraine, and that, from December 23, 2021, until the date of his arrest, February 8, 2023, he observed and photographed military units in Maykop. Then he allegedly sent the images to a representative of a foreign state. It is not specified to whom or to which state these images were sent. Lik was in the ninth grade when the alleged spying took place.

The day after Lik was arrested, the Ministry of Internal Affairs opened a case against his mother for "petty hooliganism," after she allegedly swore in a public place. She was sentenced to 10 days in prison.

According to Meduza and the human rights organization Pervy Otdel (First Department), in 2023, 101 persons were charged with "treason" and "espionage" – the highest number recorded in years.

You Might Also Like

A Very Famous Terrorist
  • December 25, 2023

A Very Famous Terrorist

Popular writer Boris Akunin has been added to the Kremlin's list of terrorists and extremists.
An Anti-War Art Awakening
  • December 18, 2023

An Anti-War Art Awakening

Anonymous artist Zless creates anti-war art that juxtaposes traditional Russian symbols and the horrors of the invasion of Ukraine.
A QR Crackdown
  • December 14, 2023

A QR Crackdown

Moscow bans QR codes on billboards in response to the Russian political opposition.
One Country, Two Wars
  • September 16, 2023

One Country, Two Wars

The Kremlin is currently conducting not one, but two horrific wars.
Like this post? Get a weekly email digest + member-only deals

Some of Our Books

Chekhov Bilingual

Chekhov Bilingual

Some of Chekhov's most beloved stories, with English and accented Russian on facing pages throughout. 
Faith & Humor: Notes from Muscovy

Faith & Humor: Notes from Muscovy

A book that dares to explore the humanity of priests and pilgrims, saints and sinners, Faith & Humor has been both a runaway bestseller in Russia and the focus of heated controversy – as often happens when a thoughtful writer takes on sacred cows. The stories, aphorisms, anecdotes, dialogues and adventures in this volume comprise an encyclopedia of modern Russian Orthodoxy, and thereby of Russian life.
A Taste of Chekhov

A Taste of Chekhov

This compact volume is an introduction to the works of Chekhov the master storyteller, via nine stories spanning the last twenty years of his life.
Marooned in Moscow

Marooned in Moscow

This gripping autobiography plays out against the backdrop of Russia's bloody Civil War, and was one of the first Western eyewitness accounts of life in post-revolutionary Russia. Marooned in Moscow provides a fascinating account of one woman's entry into war-torn Russia in early 1920, first-person impressions of many in the top Soviet leadership, and accounts of the author's increasingly dangerous work as a journalist and spy, to say nothing of her work on behalf of prisoners, her two arrests, and her eventual ten-month-long imprisonment, including in the infamous Lubyanka prison. It is a veritable encyclopedia of life in Russia in the early 1920s.
Survival Russian

Survival Russian

Survival Russian is an intensely practical guide to conversational, colloquial and culture-rich Russian. It uses humor, current events and thematically-driven essays to deepen readers’ understanding of Russian language and culture. This enlarged Second Edition of Survival Russian includes over 90 essays and illuminates over 2000 invaluable Russian phrases and words.
Murder at the Dacha

Murder at the Dacha

Senior Lieutenant Pavel Matyushkin has a problem. Several, actually. Not the least of them is the fact that a powerful Soviet boss has been murdered, and Matyushkin's surly commander has given him an unreasonably short time frame to close the case.
Russian Rules

Russian Rules

From the shores of the White Sea to Moscow and the Northern Caucasus, Russian Rules is a high-speed thriller based on actual events, terrifying possibilities, and some really stupid decisions.
Maria's War: A Soldier's Autobiography

Maria's War: A Soldier's Autobiography

This astonishingly gripping autobiography by the founder of the Russian Women’s Death Battallion in World War I is an eye-opening documentary of life before, during and after the Bolshevik Revolution.
Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

In this comprehensive, quixotic and addictive book, Edwin Trommelen explores all facets of the Russian obsession with vodka. Peering chiefly through the lenses of history and literature, Trommelen offers up an appropriately complex, rich and bittersweet portrait, based on great respect for Russian culture.
Moscow and Muscovites

Moscow and Muscovites

Vladimir Gilyarovsky's classic portrait of the Russian capital is one of Russians’ most beloved books. Yet it has never before been translated into English. Until now! It is a spectactular verbal pastiche: conversation, from gutter gibberish to the drawing room; oratory, from illiterates to aristocrats; prose, from boilerplate to Tolstoy; poetry, from earthy humor to Pushkin. 

About Us

Russian Life is a publication of a 30-year-young, award-winning publishing house that creates a bimonthly magazine, books, maps, and other products for Russophiles the world over.

Latest Posts

Our Contacts

Russian Life
73 Main Street, Suite 402
Montpelier VT 05602

802-223-4955