Court keeps ‘kidnapped activist in Russian jail

A Russian court on Wednesday ruled to keep in pre-trial detention opposition activist Leonid Razvozzhayev, who says he was kidnapped from Ukraine and forced to confess to plotting a coup. The Moscow City Court rejected a complaint filed by the defence of the activist, whose jailing late last month has led the opposition to accuse President Vladimir Putin of unleashing a wave of political repressions. The activist, who is an aide to an opposition parliament member and a supporter of radical left Left Front movement, is charged with inciting mass riots against Putin. He told rights activists last month that masked men grabbed him while he was applying for refugee status in Ukraine, and told him to confess or his children and wife will be harmed. The decision to put the 39-year-old activist was upheld despite documents from the United Nations and witness accounts provided by the defence as proof that he was kidnapped in Kiev Speaking in court Wednesday, Razvozzhayev confirmed his retraction of the confession. “This confession was forced out of me, they forced me to speak against political leaders, they threatened my family, even children,” RAPSI news agency quoted him as saying. Russian investigators had launched the probe against Razvozzhayev, Left Front leader Sergei Udaltsov, and his assistant Konstantin Lebedev after a pro-Kremlin channel aired a smear film alleging they plotted a violent coup with financial backing from Georgian lawmaker Givi Targamadze. Despite the scandalous circumstances of his arrest, the court’s decision to uphold it was expected, one of Razvozzhayev’s lawyers Anna Stavitskaya said. “This was expected, we could not hope for a different decision,” Stavitskaya told AFP. “We filed this complaint in order to use the court decision in our lawsuit to the European Court of Human Rights,” she added.