Singer and guitarist of the street music group St. St. Petersburg Stoptime has left Russia after a series of arrests and is now “safe,” independent Russian media reported late Sunday. Earlier the same day, 18-year-old Diana Loginova, who appears under the pseudonym Naoko, and Alexandr Orlov, who is four years older, were released from administrative detention. Regime forces drove the two away in cars so the musicians could not speak to waiting journalists, Petersburg portal Fontanka reported. President Vladimir Putin’s prosecutors may make his departure from the country a condition for refraining from further repression.
A series of shows of solidarity
Loginova, Orlov and their percussionist, 18-year-old Vladislav Leontiev, were arrested in mid-October after they caused trouble at a number of street concerts, mainly by playing songs by exiled Russian musicians singled out by the regime as “foreign agents,” such as the song “Cooperative Swan Lake” by rapper Noize MC, who described Putin as a “shaking grandfather.” Video of the performance spread on social media, and condemnation from activists loyal to the regime followed.
The members of Stoptime became the first street musicians in Russia to be sentenced to prison as a result of the performance – Loginova and Orlov, who were engaged at the time, received three consecutive sentences; Leontyev was released on November 9 after two similar sentences.
One of the censorship violations committed was the “discrediting of the army” carried out in the war of aggression against Ukraine directed against the younger generation, highlighting the risk of criminal prosecution. The crackdown on musicians sparked a series of solidarity shows in Petersburg and other Russian cities, which the regime later halted with further prosecutions. Also on Sunday, a young singer who organized such a concert in the city of Perm was released after his second arrest sentence.
