18 July 2018
ECHR condemns Pussy Riot
By BBC
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has condemned Russia for its handling of two high-profile cases.
It said Russia had violated five articles of the human rights convention in its arrest and conviction of Pussy Riot members in 2012.
Three women from the activist group were arrested after performing a protest song in a Moscow cathedral.
Separately, the ECHR also heavily criticised the investigation into journalist Anna Politkovskaya's murder.
Politkovskaya was shot dead in a lift in her block of flats in 2006. Five men were found guilty of her murder in 2014, although it is still not known who commissioned the assassination.
The investigative reporter was a vocal critic of Russia's war in Chechnya, and of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Russia had failed to "take adequate investigatory steps" to find who commissioned the murder, violating Article 2 of the convention, the court said.
In 2015, Russia's parliament passed a law allowing it to overrule judgements from the ECHR after the court ruled against the country for state spying.
'Multiple violations'
In the Pussy Riot case, two band members served 16 months in prison after their conviction.
Formed in 2011, the group has a varying membership of women who support feminism and agitate against President Putin and the state.
On Monday, Russia jailed four members of the band for disrupting the World Cup Final with a pitch invasion.
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