The author of the play “Finiste Yasny Sokol”, playwright Svetlana Petriychuk, who was arrested for justifying terrorism because of the play, was taken into custody in a remand center as a “person likely to commit crimes of a terrorist nature and extremist orientation. appeared in the telegram channel to support her, which is hosted by screenwriter husband Yuri Shekhvatov.
As follows from instructions The Department of Justice for the Prevention of Crime usually registers prisoners who tend to escape, who need treatment for drug and alcohol addiction, or who lead “negative orientation groups”.
The document specifies that “individual conversations” can take place with convicts placed on preventive cards, isolated from “ties that have a negative impact”, involved in work, and also “use the possibilities of family and other positive links in the educational process. ”
Yuri Shekhvatov suggests that putting his wife on a professional record in a remand center can mean “a change in the conditions of detention at the discretion of the administration, preventive conversations and special control.” “The commission’s decision, of course, will be appealed by our attorneys,” the message read.
Berkovich and Petriychuk case
Petriychuk, along with director Evgenia Berkovich, were arrested on May 4. They were accused of justifying terrorism because of the play Finist Yasny Sokol. It is based on true stories of women who married radical Islamists. In 2022, the production received the Golden Mask for Best Playwright and Best Costume Design.
The following day, May 5, the Zamoskvoretsky Court in Moscow sent the women to a remand center for two months, until July 4. As Fontanka wrote, the production was reviewed by a group of people led by the founder of so-called destructology, Roman Silantyev. Experts have found in “Finist” “the ideology of Islamism and jihadism”, as well as “signs of the ideology of radical feminism and the struggle against the androcentric social order in Russia”.
Shortly after this became known, the Spiritual Administration of Muslims (DUM) and the Russian Jewish Congress (RJC) asked the Investigative Committee to verify Silantyev’s claims for anti-Semitism. On the day Berkovich and Petriychuk were arrested, the expert told the Lomovka telegram channel that the play “Finist Yasny Sokol” “really” justified terrorism.
“These things are unacceptable. Especially when theater prizes are awarded for it, when it is promoted, even when people of Jewish nationality do it. This is not the first time I have observed Jews actively supporting Wahhabis,” he said.
The RJC said Silantyev spreads daily prejudice that incites ethnic hatred. According to the organization, the statements of the religious scholar form a negative attitude towards Jews in society, which means that his expertise in the Berkovich case cannot be objective. In addition, at the request of the organization, the Russian scientist Mikhail Dymarsky, recognized by the scientific community, carried out a linguistic examination of Silantyev’s statements.
While considering the appeal against Berkovich and Petriychuk’s arrest on May 30, the director’s lawyer, Ksenia Karpinskaya, asked the court to include the RJC’s expertise in the case. Moscow City Court introduced document on file, but left the decision on the restraint measure unchanged, acknowledging the lawful arrest of Berkovich and Petriychuk.
On the same day, dozens of Russian scientists, specialists in both the humanities and the natural sciences, signed an open appeal “against unscrupulous humanitarian expertise in courts and the legitimization of pseudoscientific knowledge”.
In the document hosted On the site of the Council for the Ethics of Scientific Publications, it is said that “destructology” in the normative fields of science and education, officially recognized in Russia, does not appear, “and it does not exist no longer in the international scientific space. The authors of the appeal also note that publications on this topic “sum up the work of one author” – Roman Silantiev.
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