On 13 October 2019, a DJ was killed in a cafe in the Leningrad region because of the music he had been playing.

“We stand with the artist and urge authorities to provide a just and commensurate response to his case,” says Delphine Pawlik, Freemuse Programme Manager.

Russian theatre director Kirill Serebrennikov has been released from house arrest after 20 months of detention and announced his return to work.

After five years in a Russian prison, Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov has finally been released in a prisoner exchange between Ukrainian and Russian governments.

Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov has been on hunger strike since 14 May to demand the release of 64 Ukrainians held in Russia on political grounds.

Russian authorities have cancelled a youth theatre play for promoting “hatred against men and non-traditional family relations”.

The Tagansky Court in Moscow, Russia upheld the ban of the rapper Husky´s clip Judas as legal.

A blogger from Tajikistan says he has received threats for the past year and was attacked in Moscow in front of a police officer.

Schoolchildren’s drawings depicting same-sex couples have been seized by Russian police and checked to see if they propagate “non-traditional values”.

A family discussing artworks at the state-owned Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow has been caught up in the gallery's crack down on illegal guided tours.