Image caption,

Artyom Kamardin read a poem criticising Russia's war in Ukraine in September 2022

By Laura Gozzi

BBC News

Two Russian poets have been handed long jail sentences for taking part in a reading of anti-war poems in Moscow.

A Moscow court gave Artyom Kamardin seven years and Yegor Shtovba five and a half years for "inciting hatred" against Russian troops and making "appeals against state security".

Both had pleaded not guilty.

The pair are the latest to be sentenced under what rights groups have condemned as an unprecedented crackdown on dissent in Russia.

A third poet who had taken part in the poetry reading, Nikolai Dayneko, was given a four-year sentence earlier this year after pleading guilty and co-operating with the investigation.

On 25 September 2022, Kamardin, 33, recited a poem at the Mayakovsky Readings - a poetry event that has attracted dissidents and activists to Triumfalnaya Square - formerly Mayakovsky Square - in central Moscow since the 1950s.