Vladimir Efimov, a local politician on the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia’s Far East, was charged with "discrediting the army” and ordered to pay a $500 fine three times in recent months over anti-war images that he displayed on social media.
When he continued, reposting battlefield pictures like the wholesale destruction of the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol under Russian bombardment, prosecutors ratcheted up the charges and accused him of a felony — punishable by up to five years in prison or stiffer fines.
"They thought that I would be afraid,” Efimov said, that the fines "would give me cold feet and make me hide away.”