Staff Writer
Pussy Riot’s Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova have been freed from prison after being there for just over a year.
Alyokhina was freed this morning from prison in Nizhny Novgorod and later joined up with offices of right groups Committee Against Torture to give telephone interviews. She also told Russian television that it was a “PR stunt” and would have preferred to remain jailed, while Tolokonnikova was freed from a prison hospital in Siberia.
In March of 2012 they were arrested and accused of “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred.” They were imprisoned in august of that year and due to be released in march 2014.
Their sentence has been object of critique by right groups, anti-Putin protesters, and foreign governments.
Thanks to an amnesty law signed by Russian parliament last week, the two Pussy Riot members were released. This law covers over 20,000 prisoners, including youths, the disabled, veterans, pregnant women and mothers – which is why Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina were included, as they are both mothers to young children.
Alyokhina spoke to Russia’s independent Dozhd TV channel stating that her views of President Putin remain the same:
“I don’t think the amnesty is a humanitarian act, I think it’s a PR stunt. In this situation, I was just a body being moved in space, nothing depended on me. If I had a choice to refuse [the amnesty], I would have, without a doubt.”
A third Pussy Riot member, Yekaterina Samutsevich was released in October of 2012. Her sentence was suspended because she had not performed the protest song for which the other two were convicted.
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