Vasiliy Ostrinsky (Ukraine)
UKRAINIAN PURVEYOR OF ANTISEMITIC
LEAFLETS SENTENCED FOR 4 YEARS.
BIGOTRY MONITOR
A Weekly Human Rights Newsletter
on Antisemitism, Xenophobia,
and Religious Persecution in the
Former Communist World
and Western Europe
Volume 8, Number 4
Friday, January 25, 2008
Vasiliy Ostrinsky, 43, was sentenced to four years in prison for distributing antisemitic leaflets in Kiev, the Ukrainian daily newspaper “Segodnya” reported on January 17. According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Jewish leaders in Ukraine were disappointed that Ostrinsky was not prosecuted under the Criminal Code for incitement of ethnic strife.
Other observers suggest that in effect he was convicted for threatening the integrity of the state, as he also published a lot of anti-Ukraine material, and that is what got him in trouble in the first place.
“It's a shame they didn't use the hate speech provision against him,” observed Nickolai Butkevich of UCSJ. “Ukraine has had only one successful conviction under that statute that I know of.”
Source:
http://www.fsumonitor.com/stories/012508BM.shtml