Arkady Babchenko* has been sentenced in absentia for posts without foreign agent labeling.
The Moscow magistrate's court has sentenced journalist and veteran of two Chechen wars Arkady Babchenko* in absentia to one and a half years in a penal colony for publications on Telegram without indicating the status of a foreign agent.
Author of several books about the war in Chechnya, Arkady Babchenko* was born in 1977 in Moscow. In 1996, while serving as a conscript soldier, Babchenko was involved in the first Chechen war, later participating in the second Chechen campaign as a contractor. As a military correspondent for "Novaya Gazeta", he visited the conflict zone in South Ossetia in 2008. On May 29, 2018, information appeared that Babchenko* had been shot in Kyiv; the next day, the Security Service of Ukraine stated that he was alive, and the murder was staged to catch the organizers of the assassination.
Babchenko* was charged under the article on evasion of duties as a foreign agent (part 2 of article 330.1 of the Criminal Code of Russia), which provides for up to two years of imprisonment or forced labor. The case was considered in judicial section No. 412.
The case was initiated due to posts published in the journalist's Telegram channel in 2025 without indicating the status of a foreign agent. Babchenko* was added to the Ministry of Justice's foreign agents register in April 2023. After that, he was fined twice under administrative protocols for failing to fulfill the duties of a foreign agent, and he did not pay the fines, noted the state prosecutor.
The prosecutor emphasized that Babchenko, who left Russia in 2017, disagrees with "the main directions of Russia's foreign and domestic policy, including in the field of defense" and harbors "dislike for the president's activities," reports "Mediazona"*.
The defense was represented by a court-appointed lawyer, who noted that "the defense has no evidence, neither of the defendant nor anyone else." Nevertheless, in the debates, he requested to terminate the case: the lawyer stated that his client's guilt was not proven, as there is no reliable data that the Telegram channel belongs to Babchenko*.
The prosecutor requested one year in a penal colony for the defendant, but the court sentenced Babchenko* to one and a half years.
At the first court session, it became known that Babchenko* was wanted in another case regarding public justification of terrorism on the internet (part 2 of article 205.2 of the Criminal Code of Russia, from five to seven years of imprisonment). The journalist was added to the Rosfinmonitoring register back in 2020; however, the specific article under which the case was initiated had not been known before. The verdict in this case has not yet been announced, notes the human rights project "Politizak-Info".
"Caucasian Knot" also reported that in the fall of 2024, the Rostov Regional court sentenced former civil servant Elena Popova to 12 years in prison, finding her guilty of transferring money to the armed forces of Ukraine. Popova transferred money to an account published on Arkady Babchenko's* social media. Human rights activists recognized her as a political prisoner, emphasizing that the investigation did not prove the guilt of the Rostov resident.
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* included in the Russian register of foreign agents.
** the activities of the Meta company (which owns Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp) are banned in Russia.