Antiwar Activist Sentenced to 27 Years for Blogger's Assassination; Pro-War Critic Jailed

In a stark warning to critics of the war in Ukraine, Russia imposes harshest sentence for a woman in modern history and jails a pro-war blogger for extremism.

Darya Trepova, an antiwar activist, has been sentenced to 27 years in prison by a Russian court for the assassination of pro-war blogger Vladlen Tatarsky, marking the harshest sentence for a woman in modern Russian history.
Trepova handed Tatarsky a statuette rigged with explosives in a St. Petersburg cafe, causing an explosion that killed Tatarsky and injured over 30 others.
Trepova maintains that she was unaware the statuette contained explosives, believing it to be a listening device, and claims she was set up by contacts in Ukraine.
In a separate case, Igor Girkin, a former military commander and pro-war blogger who criticized President Putin's approach to the war in Ukraine, was sentenced to four years in prison on extremism charges.
Both cases are seen as a warning to Russians critical of the war in Ukraine, whether they are antiwar activists or pro-war critics of the Kremlin's strategy.