Russia frees editor after outcry

SAINT PETERSBURG: A Russian court on Monday released a newspaper editor and former lawmaker, who had been held on extortion charges, after an outcry from supporters and international organisations.

Igor Rudnikov, founder and editor of Novye Kolesa in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, had been in detention since November 2017, accused of extorting $50,000 from a senior investigator. The prosecution had demanded a 10-year sentence for the 53-year-old.

Supporters had vehemently contested the charges, calling them punishment for his journalism. On Monday, a district court in the second city of Saint Petersburg reduced the charges, convicting him of acting without lawful authority.

The judge sentenced Rudnikov to community service and set him free. "He has been released in the courtroom," the Moskovsky district court said in a statement. In June 2017, Rudnikov´s newspaper claimed that the head of the Investigative Committee for the Kaliningrad region, Viktor Ledenev, owned an undeclared luxurious country home. Several months later Rudnikov was badly beaten and arrested.