Independent journalist Alexey Seregin from Mari El has become a defendant in a case of "justifying terrorism."
The reason for initiating a criminal case was a comment about a separatist. Dzhokhara Dudayeva, “justifying illegal armed groups in Chechnya in the 1990s,” 7x7 sources report. Seregin left this comment in 2024 in "Shoemaker Chat".
Security forces detained the journalist the day before at a bus stop. During the arrest, they beat him, confiscated his phone, and then took him home for a search.
Afterwards, Seryogin was taken away for questioning and detained for 48 hours. A pretrial detention measure is planned for him. The Insider reports that lawyers approached by the journalist's family are refusing to represent him.
Alexey Seregin He is known for his coverage of political trials. He runs a Telegram channel about the problems of his region, "Nothing Will Happen in Mari El." In 2024, the Ministry of Justice declared the journalist a "foreign agent."
In February 2025, a court fined him 5,000 rubles under the administrative offense of "participating in the activities of an undesirable organization" for retelling an investigation by the publication "Proekt" on a Telegram channel. A few days earlier, the court dismissed another case against him under the same offense: that time, the reason was a reference to a news story by the publication "Agency."