Moscow -
Russia hit back on Sunday at international criticism of the two-year jail sentences handed down to the punk band Pussy Riot, comparing it to similar laws in force abroad.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said in an online statement that similar laws to those used to prosecute the all-female band applied in Germany, according to the Ria Novosti news agency.
Three members of Pussy Riot were sentenced to two years in jail on Friday, after being found guilty of hooliganism and inciting religious hatred for an impromptu performance of an anti-Putin song in a Moscow cathedral earlier this year.
Germany's criminal code, for example, allows up to three years in prison for “disturbance of religious worship” or “abusing a denomination”, Lukashevich said.
On the day of the verdicts, a spokesman for President Vladimir Putin refused to comment, saying it was a matter for the courts.
Meanwhile, a prominent Russian activist and blogger, Alexei Navalny, called for the outside world to impose sanctions against Putin in the wake of the sentences.
Navalny, a lawyer and prominent critic of Putin, told Germany's Der Spiegel magazine that other countries must take measures against Putin's “corrupt environment.”
Navalny, who last month was charged with embezzlement over a timber deal, also said he was ready to play a larger role in the Russian opposition.
Critics of Putin must use the internet as a tool to gain legitimacy, he added.
Navalny, an organiser of some of the anti-Putin rallies in Moscow ahead of the country's presidential election in March, has rejected as “absurd” the allegations that he had siphoned off about 38 000 euros (46 880 dollars).
If found guilty he could face up to 10 years in prison. He is not allowed to leave his residence without police permission. - Sapa-dpa