Maria Ponomarenko handed third conviction
Journalist Maria Ponomarenko, already serving a sentence under Russia’s ‘military fakes’ law, has had her prison term extended again. She was sentenced to one year and ten months in a penal colony in a new case concerning the alleged use of violence against a prison officer. Taking into account the unserved portions of her earlier sentences, her total outstanding term now stands at two years and three months. The sentencing was reported by RusNews.
A third criminal case against the journalist was opened in August 2025 following an incident at Penal Colony No. 9 in Rubtsovsk, Altai Krai. According to a prison service officer, he entered Ponomarenko’s cell to prevent a suicide attempt — a towel was tied around her neck.
‘Ponomarenko, standing in the corner with her back to the entrance, pushed him back and demanded not to be touched. In response, the prison officer began forcibly restraining the journalist, pressed her face against a table, then threw her to the floor, kneeling on her back and pulling her by the hair,’ a RusNews correspondent reported, summarising her testimony. In her own account: ‘In a semi-conscious state, she simply pushed them away and asked not to be touched. When one of the officers touched her shoulder, she moved his hand away, accidentally touching his cheek with her finger — an act later treated as an assault.’
Maria Ponomarenko told the court that she had tied a short towel around her neck — which she said was too short to be used for hanging — in order to draw attention to the intolerable conditions in which she was being held. She suffered severe attacks of claustrophobia in her cell and at one point broke part of the cell grille. Prison staff ignored her condition. Constant building work was underway near her cell, and rats emerged from the sewage pipes. She received no further psychiatric assessment and her treatment was not adjusted.
Maria Ponomarenko was detained in April 2022 over a post about the Russian air strike on the drama theatre in Mariupol. She was sentenced to six years in a penal colony under paragraph ‘e’, part 2 of Article 207.3 of the Russian Criminal Code concerning the dissemination of ‘military fakes’. In November 2023, a first criminal case concerning the alleged use of violence against a prison officer under part 2 of Article 321 was opened against her, and a verdict in that case was handed down in March 2025. While in custody, Maria Ponomarenko has made several suicide attempts, one of which required a blood transfusion.
