Masked people, bloggers and journalists, who came to the rally to support the imprisoned editor-in-chief of Sputnik Lithuania, Marat Kasem. Maria Butina, member of the State Duma Committee on International Relations, told socialbites.ca about this. According to him, those who participated in the strike wore masks because of the cold weather.
“They wear masks because it’s -25 degrees outside. Various colleagues. There are bloggers and journalists out there. In particular, you correctly mentioned [Дмитрия] Kiseleva. Petr Lidov came with us and many of our colleagues from Sputnik. It’s really cold. However, despite the frosts, we found it necessary to participate in this action today and unlawful acts are taking place and we express our anger at the fact that a person is being tried for his professional journalistic activities. This is unacceptable,” said Butina.
According to him, the protesters wanted to attract the attention of Latvian authorities and residents.
“The main task of the action is to attract the attention of our journalists. And of course, to draw the attention of the Latvian authorities to the fact that there is legal lawlessness, the Latvian people to the fact that legal lawlessness is taking place in their own state. For their part, they should agree with this, because they are actually trying to convict a person for an opinion that differs from the opinion of the authorities. This does not suit the local population, they need to realize that. I’m sure Marat will know about it. This is a man in trouble. He must understand that he stands by the Russian people, stands by his colleagues. We will support and help him. They’ve already hired a professional lawyer,” he said.
Butina added that despite the current coronavirus restrictions, an agreement has been reached with the capital’s authorities on the picket: “[Акция] agreed.”
Marat Kasem, editor-in-chief of Sputnik Lithuania (MIA Rossiya Segodnya), arrested On the eve of Latvian special services in Riga.
The Latvian State Security Service reported that the journalist was detained on suspicion of violating EU sanctions. The article about espionage that the media mentioned earlier is not included in the report.