Pussy Riot’s Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina Beaten By Cossacks In Sochi

Art/Punk band members Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina from Pussy Riot were filmed on Wednesday being whipped, kicked and punched in the face by Cossacks, while preforming a protest song in Sochi, the town hosting the Winter Olympics. “Now there is an occupation of this territory, because the city is under total police and security control,” Tolokonnikova said on Tuesday. “We have arrived here on Sunday, we are being detained all the time. Even when we were driving our car and walking in the street. So they are looking for any reasons to arrest us.”Ms Tolokonnikova said they were detained for 10 hours by police on suspicion of theft from a hotel on Monday. We are here “to make a political claim about the Sochi Olympics” they stated.

Whether this is misinformation or not. it has been claimed that six members of Pussy Riot signed an open letter insisting that Ms Alyokhina and Ms Tolokonnikova should no longer be described as members of the art/punk rock collective. The remaining members of the group said the pair had forgotten about the “aspirations and ideals of our group” and were wrong to appear at an Amnesty International concert in New York.

Footage shows the women beaten with horsewhips violently assaulted by the Cossacks, who are patrolling the winter games. Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina both served prison sentences in 2012/2013 for their anti Putin Moscow church performance which was described as hooliganism.

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