Associated Press — Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday announced that authorities would confiscate money, valuables and other assets from people convicted of spreading “deliberately false information” about the country’s military. signed into law recognizing it.
The bill passed the lower house and upper house of Russia’s parliament and was approved unanimously by the upper house last week.
Speaker of the Duma Vyacheslav Volodin said the measures include harsher punishments for “traitors who have thrown mud at our country and our armed forces,” adding that “the miscreants will be stripped of their honorary titles and have their assets, money and other Valuables will be confiscated.”
Russian officials are using current laws against “discrediting” the military, which targets crimes such as “legitimizing terrorism” and spreading “fake news” about the military, to silence Putin’s critics. is used. Several activists, bloggers, and ordinary Russians received long prison sentences.
The new confiscation law also applies to those convicted of publicly inciting “extremist activities” and calling for acts harmful to national security or “discrediting” the military. After the Russian government sent troops to Ukraine in February 2022, a law adopted as part of the government’s sweeping crackdown on opposition made it a criminal offense to discredit the Russian military.
Russia’s state-run TASS news agency said that if someone is convicted under the new law, only money, assets and assets “obtained through criminal means” or used in activities contrary to Russia’s national security can be confiscated. He said that only. Strict Soviet-era laws allowed foreclosure of homes for various criminal acts.
