Russian journalist who staged anti-war protest on state TV flees country

The Russian journalist who staged a one-woman anti-war protest on state television has fled the country after being added to a national “wanted” list.

Marina Ovsyannikova, who was placed under house arrest after the TV stunt in March, left Russia recently amid growing turmoil over Russian President Vladimir Putin’s civilian mobilization order to continue his country’s war with Ukraine.

“Ovsyannikova and her daughter left Russia a few hours after departing from the address where she was under house arrest. They are in Europe now,” the former Channel One editor’s lawyer Dmitry Zakhvatov told Agence France-Presse.

He continued: “They are fine. They are waiting until they can talk about publicly, but for now it is not safe.”

Ovsyannikova was fined 30,000 rubles, equivalent to about $270, for “organizing unsanctioned actions” after she held up an anti-war sign during a broadcast on state-run Channel One.

“Stop the war. Don’t believe propaganda. They’re lying to you here,” read the sign.

The former journalist was later charged with spreading false information about Russian armed forces and ordered to be placed under house arrest for more than two months.

She was added to Russia’s “wanted” list after escaping house arrest before she fled the country.

Ovsyannikova recorded a video before her on-air protest where she apologized for participating in “Kremlin propaganda.”

“I’m very ashamed of it — that I let people lie from TV screens and allowed the Russian people to be zombified,” she said in the video.

Ovsyannikova told CNN in March that she felt a “cognitive dissonance” between her beliefs and what she was compelled to say on television that motivated her to make a viral statement.

“The war was the point of no return,” she said. “I realized that I either would need to do something or we would reach a point of no return and it would be more and more difficult to do anything.”

She added: “I wanted to show to the world that Russians are against the war, the majority of Russians.”