The 1st Western District Military Court sentenced 21-year-old St. Petersburg resident Vladislav Belkevich to seven years in a general-regime penal colony. He was found guilty in a case involving calls for terrorism and the rehabilitation of Nazism, according to Vot Tak, citing people close to him.
The sentence was handed down on June 30, 2026. In a letter from pretrial detention, Belkevich said prosecutors had requested nine years in prison.
He was detained and placed in a detention center in July 2025. At the time, the St. Petersburg courts' press service said the criminal case stemmed from comments and posts in Telegram channel chats linked to the Russian Volunteer Corps. Investigators say the messages were posted from December 2023 through April 2025.
During court proceedings, authorities also said Belkevich had been accused of spreading wartime “fake news,” calling for activity against state security, and calling for participation in mass unrest.
However, according to the case file listed on the court’s website, the final charges included five counts of justifying terrorism and two counts of rehabilitating Nazism.
Vot Tak reports that Belkevich ran a VKontakte page where he published satirical comics, while also developing a Telegram channel and streaming on YouTube. At present, his social media pages and channels are hidden or deleted.