Pussy Riot launch prison watch website

The former members of protest-punk group Pussy Riot have launched a new website scrutinising abuses within the Russian prison system. Nadezhda Tolokonnikova announced the group’s new initiative, called Media Zona, today on social media, saying: “This is an answer to the question about what we’ve been doing since we left prison just before New Year 2014.”

Early in 2012, in a trial which captured world attention two of the members of the group, Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina were jailed for 22 months on charges of “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred” after singing an anti-Putin song in Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Saviour. While imprisoned in harsh conditions, Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina became active critics of the way prisons are run in Russia.

In September 2013 Tolokonnikova went on hunger strike in protest at her treatment at Penal Colony No 14 near Penza in south central Russia. Since their release, the pair have been vocal in their condemnation of the Russian justice system. In March this year the pair launched a prisoners’ rights charity, Zona Prava.

Media Zona, which went live today, is a reference to the Russian word for prison, zona. Preempting the question of what the site was for, Tolokonnikova explained that Media Zona would cover: “Trials, prisons, arrests, sentences, prison riots, political cases, police crime, and the fate of prisoners — not just ‘political’ prisoners, but all the others too.”

The list of founders on the site includes Pyotr Verzilov, also a member of the feminist collective, and editor-in-chief Sergei Smirnov, formerly of news site Russkaya Planeta.

Recent weeks have seen an upsurge in interest in independent media projects, with businessman Dmitry Zimin creating a fund to support non-governmental information resources, and former Lenta editor Galina Timchenko announcing the launch of a new Riga-based Russian-language news site.

See also:

Pussy Riot members to launch prisoners’ rights NGO

Pussy Riot: one year on

Pussy Riot documentary wins Sundance

Pussy Riot to star in House of Cards episode