A pair of women living in Ukraine’s Russian-occupied region of Crimea have been fined after singing a Ukrainian fighting anthem on social media.
Olga Valeyeva, who won the Miss Crimea 2022 beauty pageant, and another unnamed woman were found guilty of discrediting the Russian army for singing the song “Chervona Kalyna,” according to local authorities. Valeyeva has been fined 40,000 rubles, equal to about $673, while the other woman was sentenced to prison for 10 days, according to CBS.
“I didn’t know that this song was connected with something and is somehow forbidden,” Valeyeva wrote on social media, according to a translation provided by the outlet. “We just sang a Ukrainian song. We thought it was just a little song that we knew for a long time.”
UKRAINE CAPTURES IRANIAN DRONE USED BY RUSSIANS INTACT
In addition to discrediting the Russian army, the women, born in 1987 and 1989, were also guilty of publicly demonstrating Nazi symbols, the Interior Ministry of Crimea wrote in a Telegram post. It is not clear what symbols were used by the women, as the video has since been deleted, though Russia alleges that national symbols for Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, are extremist, according to the outlet.
Oleg Kriuchkov, an aide to the governor of Crimea, wrote on Telegram that no one is punished for singing “normal Ukrainian songs,” but that “nationalist hymns” are not permitted.
In September, the same song the two women sang on social media was played at a wedding in Crimea, leading to a warning from Moscow-installed head of the peninsula Sergei Aksyonov that authorities would react “harshly” to anyone singing this song or similar ones. People who continue to sing these forbidden songs “are acting like traitors,” he said in a video posted to Telegram.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
The United States announced Tuesday that it is providing Ukraine with another military aid package valued at approximately $625 million. The latest aid brings the total U.S. military assistance to more than $16.8 billion since Russia invaded in February.
