On June 20, Belgorod volunteer Nadezhda Rossinskaya, 30, also known as Nadine Geisler, was sentenced to 22 years in prison on charges of treason and aiding terrorism. At the start ...

On June 20, Belgorod volunteer Nadezhda Rossinskaya, 30, also known as Nadine Geisler, was sentenced to 22 years in prison on charges of treason and aiding terrorism. At the start of the full-scale war, the volunteer group she founded, Army of Beauties, actively helped Ukrainian refugees. Later, Geisler left for Georgia, but then returned to Russia and was detained in February 2024. The grounds for her arrest under the article on “public calls for activities against state security” was an Instagram post calling for donations to the Ukrainian Azov battalion. The activist denied any involvement with this account. She was subsequently charged with “treason” and “aiding terrorism.”

Geisler’s case was heard by the 2nd Western District Military Court in part behind closed doors. Two Mediazona sources claim that before the trial began, FSB officers strongly discouraged Belgorod journalists from covering it. Many details are still unknown, but the activist’s closing statement, in which she refutes the investigation’s version point by point, sheds some light on the indictment.

In particular, she mentions accusations of directing drones in the Kharkiv region, although her passport did not contain any marks about crossing the Ukrainian border. As well as testimony against her given by her sister, who was brought to court from a psychoneurological hospital, accompanied by a nurse.

  • nkat2112@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    3·
    1 day ago

    But even if I am convicted, even if I end my days behind bars, I will not die childless, as some would have wanted. I have awarded myself the right to be considered a mother of many children. A mother to all the children I have managed to help. And no punishment will ever overshadow the joy from the fact that they are all alive and safe.

    You can fabricate evidence. You can intimidate and create witnesses. But you cannot destroy the truth in the form of tens of thousands of people who have been helped and millions of people who are witnesses to that. I fought for every human life in every possible and impossible way. I allowed myself the luxury of having a personal opinion and expressing it publicly. I spoke the truth that they wanted to hide.

    But I am not a criminal or a murderer, and there is not a drop of blood on my hands. And yet they still asked for 27 years. That was their demand. My goal isn’t to be free—it’s to remain a human being.

    My goodness, this young lady is so based. I feel horrible that she’s been imprisoned. I hope one day soon we have positive developments and we hear of her being released.