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Court to begin consideration of Pussy Riot case

The defense lawyers of the complainants will insist on the maximum punishment for the girls

MOSCOW, July 20 (Itar-Tass) — On Friday, July 20, the Khamovnichesky District Court of Moscow will begin the consideration of the case of a “punk-prayer service” of the Pussy Riot feminist punk-rock group in the Christ the Savior Cathedral. The defense lawyers of the complainants will insist on the maximum punishment for the girls. At the same time, a request was sent to Prosecutor General Yuri Chaika to investigate law violations during previous actions of the scandalous punk band.

The indictment had been approved on July 11, Novye Izvestia recalls. The media also then circulated quotes from the case files where it was said that the Pussy Riot group members “blasphemously humiliated the age-old foundations of the Russian Orthodox Church” and “inflicted deep spiritual injuries on Orthodox Christians.” These phrases were included in the text of the indictment. “Such statements have nothing to do with law or with Orthodoxy,” said lawyer of the girls Violetta Volkova. In her opinion, this is not about religion, but “the revival of the Inquisition.”

The complainants’ defense in the case of the scandalous action of the Pussy Riot group members in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior will insist on the maximum punishment for them, writes Komsomolskaya Pravda. “I think that the court has every reason to apply the sanction provided for by the RF Criminal Code Article under which they are charged - seven years in prison,” the lawyer of the complainants Mikhail Kuznetsov said. “Judging by the case materials, by their defiant behavior, the maximum penalty is possible. Seven volumes of the criminal case contain all the evidence, and the whole description of the punishable offence is completely covered by the documents and videos.”

In the meantime, a new attack has been launched on the arrested members of the Pussy Riot group, Nezavisimaya Gazeta notes. On Wednesday, head of the State Duma Committee on the Affairs of Family, Women and Children Yelena Mizulina turned to Prosecutor General Yuri Chaika with a request to check all actions with the participation of the arrested members of the Pussy Riot group for violations of the law. “We assume that this act of hooliganism that went unpunished later made the Pussy Riot group members believe in the permissibility of such actions and further contributed to the commission of increasingly lawless actions,” the press service of the State Duma quotes Mizulina’s request.

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