Moments before the journalist Ivan Safronov was told he would be facing 24 years in prison, a Russian prosecutor offered him a deal.

Sign a confession, she said during a final courtroom break, and she would recommend a 12-year sentence instead. Safronov answered immediately.

“He told her to get lost,”said Evgeny Smirnov, his lawyer, in an interview. “He told her that fairly harshly.”

A Russian judge is expected to deliver a verdict on Monday in one of the most significant prosecutions against a Russian journalist in decades.

Safronov, a former military correspondent for Kommersant and Vedomosti, is facing a “record” sentence on treason charges that have been prosecuted with secret evidence behind closed doors.

Source: Russian journalist facing 24-year jail term for treason refuses to sign ‘confession’ | Russia | The Guardian

Source: Chile votes on a landmark new constitution – Vox

Lyudmila Pavlichenko in combat at Sevastopol. With 309 confirmed kills, she was one the deadliest snipers in history, June 1942.

Source: Incredible Photos of Soviet Women Snipers in World War II ~ Vintage Everyday

Plastic emissions from rivers remain the main source of plastic pollution from a global ocean perspective. Plastic lost at sea has a higher chance of accumulating offshore than plastic emitted from rivers, leading to high concentrations of fishing-related debris in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch [or GPGP]. New findings confirm the oceanic garbage patches cannot be cleaned solely through river interception and highlight the potentially vital role of fishing and aquaculture in ridding the world’s oceans of plastic…. Source: Fishing at Sea Created at Least 75% of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch – Slashdot

Ivan Neparatov, leader of a Russian criminal gang, was serving 25 years for five murders and multiple other crimes when he was offered his freedom and money in exchange for fighting Russia’s war against Ukraine.  He was one of at very least one thousand convicted criminals who have agreed to fight in the Wagner unit, and one of an unknown number who have already been killed.  It is likely that all such ‘fighters’ are intentionally used as cannon fodder, to avoid questions upon their return to Russia, but Neparatov did, nonetheless, posthumously receive a state award ‘for bravery’ from Russian leader Vladimir Putin.  One assumes that certain details about this ‘defender of Russia’ will be omitted from any official documentation.

The issue is not only Neparatov’s criminal past.  It is illegal in Russia to be a mercenary, yet the so-called ‘Wagner private military company’ [the Wagner unit] are openly recruiting convicted criminals, offering substantial amounts of money, as well as the promise of freedom in exchange for agreeing to fight against Ukraine.  The prisoners are visited in prison, with the Wagner unit recruiters accompanied by Penal Service officials and members of the FSB [Security Service].  At least some of the recruiting visits are reported to be with the head of the Wagner unit, Dmitry Utkin and its financer, Yevgeny Prigozhin, or ‘Putin’s chef’, the millionaire under western sanctions who is himself a convicted criminal, imprisoned twice for violent crimes.

Source: Russia releases convicted mass murderer to fight in Ukraine, then awards him ‘for bravery’

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