Pussy Riot should be freed, says Russian PM

Published on 13/09/2012 00:00

Russian prime minister Dmitry Medvedev has said he believes three female members of punk band Pussy Riot, who were sentenced to two years in jail last month for a political protest in a Moscow cathedral, should be freed.

Mr Medvedev, who was president for four years until May, appeared in the comments yesterday to be trying to disassociate himself from the jail terms which were condemned as excessive by the West and rights groups at home, as well as by liberal Russians.

When he was president, Mr Medvedev styled himself as a liberal reformer, and though he handed the presidency back to Vladimir Putin he has made it clear he wants to remain in politics and perhaps even return to the presidency one day.

The three band members – Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina and Yekaterina Samutsevich – were convicted of hooliganism motivated by religious hatred on 17 August after belting out a profanity-laced song criticising Mr Putin on the altar of Moscow’s main cathedral in February. They have been in jail since March and their appeal is due to start being heard on 1 October.

“The prolongation of their incarceration in jail seems to me to be unproductive,” Mr Medvedev said. “A suspended sentence, taking into account time they have already spent [in jail], would be entirely sufficient,” he added.

Mr Medvedev criticised the women, saying he was “sickened by what they did, by their looks, by the hysteria which followed”.

He said prison is “very, very strict” punishment as a rule.

Mr Medvedev emphasised he was expressing his personal view and was not seeking to influence the case.

The band members were each sentenced to two years in prison.