10 days of arrest for hoisted flag of Ukraine on a high-rise in Moscow

A court in Moscow sentenced three activists detained after a pro-Ukrainian rally on a skyscraper building on Kotelnicheskaya Embankment to ten days of administrative arrest.

Activists found guilty of disobeying the lawful order of a police officer.

On monday group of five hung the Ukrainian flag on the scaffolding around the building in the Russian capital, which is among the seven “Stalinist skyscrapers” built in Moscow at the end of the 1940s - the beginning of the 1950s.

As the representative of the Unity of Equals movement, who conducted this action called “Ukraine with love”, told the Russian Service Bi-bi-si, an outfit of machine gunners arrived to arrest the participants.

At the time of the detention, the activists did not have passports with them, and the impossibility of presenting them was regarded as failure to comply with police demands.

The rally was timed to the second anniversary of the beginning of mass protests against the government in Ukraine, known as Euromaidan. In addition to the Ukrainian flag, activists hanged on the forests also the flag of Russia with the emblem of the European Union depicted on it.

Rufer Mustang

The high-rise building on Kotelnicheskaya Embankment has already been used for a similar action last summer. 20 August 2014 on his spire raised the flag of Ukraine, and the star of the crowning Stalin high-rise was repainted in yellow-blue colors.

In fact what happened was a case of vandalism. Soon, the police detained several suspects who denied their guilt and claimed that they were really going up to the skyscrapers, but only to jump down with a parachute.

After the suspects were detained, the Ukrainian rufer took responsibility for the incident, known as Grisha Mustang. He stated that he had repainted the star on his own and raised the flag, stressing non-participation of the detainees.

As proof posted self, made them on the spire of the building during the painting of the star.

20 August 2014, the star above the Moscow high-rise on Kotelnicheskaya Embankment was repainted in the yellow-blue colors of the Ukrainian flag. Photo: Instagram mustangwanted

Russian court justified four of the five detainees, and the fifth sentenced to two years and three months in prison for aiding Mustang. A criminal case was initiated against the Ukrainian rufer in Russia, but Kiev refused to hand over the Mustang. Moreover, the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Arsen Avakov said that he expressed gratitude to him and handed him a personal pistol.