Russian Exiled Politician Leonid Gozman Sentenced to 10 Years for Supporting Terrorism

A military court in Moscow has sentenced exiled politician Leonid Gozman to ten years in prison in absentia for «justifying terrorism,» authorities announced on Friday.

The Investigative Committee of Russia, responsible for major crime investigations, stated that the charges were based on an interview Gozman conducted with a «foreign media outlet» in 2023.

The exiled news site Mediazona identified this outlet as the Russian-language version of the German tabloid Bild, highlighting that Gozman was accused of expressing support for Ukrainian drone strikes targeting Moscow and bomb attacks on a bridge connecting annexed Crimea to Russia.

Last year, Gozman received a separate in absentia sentence of eight and a half years for disseminating “false information” regarding the Russian military. Earlier this year, Russia’s state financial regulator Rosfinmonitoring included Gozman on its list of “terrorists and extremists.”

Gozman left Russia in September 2022 after serving consecutive 15-day jail terms for blog posts from 2013 and 2020 that drew parallels between the Soviet government and the Nazi regime.

Prior to that, the Justice Ministry designated Gozman as a «foreign agent» and detained him for allegedly not disclosing his dual citizenship of Russia and Israel to the authorities.

Gozman was the final leader of the Union of Right Forces, a minor political party that included exiled former Putin advisor Anatoly Chubais and the assassinated opposition figure Boris Nemtsov. The party disbanded in 2008.