Pussy Riot Trial: Putin Urges Leniency for Russian Punk Rockers

Nadezhda Tolokonnikova (L), Yekaterina Samutsevich(C) and Maria Alyokhina, members of female punk band "Pussy Riot", attend their trial inside the defendant's cell in a court in Moscow August 3, 2012. (Photo: REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov)

Russian President Vladimir Putin says Russian punk trio Pussy Riot should not face tough sentencing for their protest against him in Moscow’s main cathedral.

The female musicians are on trial over hooliganism charges after a video of their anti-Putin song appeared online.

“There is nothing good in what they did [but] I don’t think they should be judged too severely,” Putin told reporters in London on Thursday.

Host Aaron Schachter talks with Miriam Elder, of The Guardian, who has been following the trial in Moscow.

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Aaron Schachter: As expected, Russia said no on the Syria referendum, but Russia’s president Vladimir Putin may be signaling a change on a different issue. Yesterday Putin said three members of the punk band Pussy Riot shouldn’t be judged too severely. That may be news to the three women now on trial for their anti-Putin performance in Moscow’s most revered church back in February. The three are charged with hooliganism and could go to prison for seven years if convicted. Miriam Elder of the Guardian Newspaper is covering the trial, she’s in Moscow. Miriam, what are people making of Putin’s comments?

Miriam Elder: Well I spoke to the defense lawyers this morning shortly after Putin’s comments came out, and the way that they’re taking it is that this is Putin’s signal to the judge. It’s something he often does, makes comments through the media, that sort of spells out how justice should play out. It’s his way of telling the judge, “don’t hand down the full seven years, give the women a smaller sentence.”

Schachter: And does it usually work that way, with Putin giving signals, and are those signals taken?

Elder: Yeah, there’s a long history of it, including with the case against Pussy Riot, the charges against them were levied after he made some comments saying how much he disagreed with what they had done. Russia has a very politicized court system, and you can see it just in the conviction rate. It’s over 99%.

Schachter: What’s your take on how the case is going so far?

Elder: I’ve been to a few court cases in Russia in my time here, and this is probably the most absurd that I’ve ever sat in upon. The words that the lawyers are using are the words for show trial, and I’ve never felt like I’ve sat through a show trial before but that’s what it feels like this time.

Schachter: You’ve been Tweeting throughout the trial, sometimes quite caustically, and you’ve been quite cutting about the judge. Why is that?

Elder: It’s so one-sided, what’s happening in that courtroom. The judge is completely dismissive of the defense, sometimes it’s as if they don’t even exist. They’ll raise objections and she’ll just sort of turn the other way and pretend she hasn’t heard them. Otherwise, it really reaches such levels of absurdity that I’ve even toned down what I’ve put on Twitter sometimes. It’s impossible to describe fully what’s happening there.

Schachter: There’s a funny one I just read where you talked about the judge cutting down the defense, and you wrote “the dog barks.”

Elder: Yeah, there’s been a dog in the courtroom since day one. Most days it’s this gigantic Rottweiler. It’s quite interesting that the dog follows the women whenever they leave the room for a break. It seems to me that it could be put there as a means of intimidation, but the guards have their own explanations.

Schachter: Is it an accident that the judge is a woman?

Elder: I think it is quite interesting, and I hadn’t thought about it before, whether they assigned a female judge to this case on purpose since Pussy Riot is a feminist punk band, but I’m not quite sure.

Schachter: So how much longer do these three women have to wait before the trial ends, and what still has to happen?

Elder: The trial is moving incredibly fast, three out of the five days it’s gone on until 10:00 pm. So they’re moving through as quickly as possible, and it looks like a verdict could come next week, possibly early next week. What has to happen next is they’re finishing up with the defense witnesses right now I believe and then the women will give their closing statements, the prosecution will give their closing statement, and then the judge will recess to deliberate.

Schachter: Now this trial may be going quickly, but they’re spending a lot of time on what you seem to suggest is an already done deal.

Elder: And that’s what makes this case interesting, it’s interesting in many ways, but in one in particular way is they’re not really going by procedure. You know, usually they try to follow some kind of procedure of justice, but this time it’s just kind of ignoring appeals by the defense entirely. Usually they try to go through the motions, this time they’re doing sort of a superficial version of that and just running through it.

Schachter: The Guardian’s Miriam Elder in Moscow, check out her Tweets and what others have been saying about the case in the Twittersphere at Theworld.org. Miriam, thank you so much for the update.

Elder: Thank you.

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