Russian protest group and performance-art collective Pussy Riot that were released from prison last December after serving the majority of two year sentence for performing their famous protest song “Punk Prayer” in Moscow’s main cathedral against President Vladimir Putin, have been attacked with whips and teargas ahead of a planned protest in Sochi.
Members of the group, including Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alekhina alongside other members, have been beaten with horsewhips by the Russian Cossack militia, who are helping to patrol the host city of Sochi during the Winter Olympics. The group of five women and one man gathered a few miles from where the Winter Olympics are currently being held for a protest performance but shortly afterwards, the Cossacks and other security personnel moved in to detain them.
In the captured footage of the incident, one Cossack appears to have used a spray substance on one of the band member’s face, whilst another officer proceeds to whip several of the group’s members with a horse whip and another Cossack ripped band member’s masks off and threw the group’s guitar away. The incident lasted a few minutes with one of the group members left with blood on their face, police arrived shortly after but no arrests were made.
Tolokonnikova wrote on Twitter soon after, “Cossacks attacked Pussy Riot by a Sochi 2014 banner, hitting us with whips and spraying us with teargas, as we were singing the song ‘Putin Will Teach You to Love the Motherland’.”
Check out the shocking footage below:
#Peace.Love.PussyRiot
