Maria Aljochina is the lead singer of the notorious activist Russian punk band Pussy Riot. She is touring Europe with her group after she escaped from her homeland disguised as a meal deliverer in mid-May. The music group raises money for the children’s hospital in Kyiv. “We want to be there for Ukraine,” Aljochina tells NU.nl.
Maria Aljochina (33) has played to packed houses in Germany for a week. On Thursday evening, Pussy Riot arrived in Amsterdam after a ten-hour journey and she and her band members Olga Borisova and Diana Burkot sat at the table at the talk show. Op1.
On Friday morning they are pale together, about to travel to Leuven in Belgium for another performance. On Saturday Pussy Riot will return to Amsterdam to play there.
“I’m happy that I can perform anywhere with the band,” says Aljochina. “Here we have a podium, we can make ourselves heard. We are of course against the dictator Putin and his war. But we also want to tell you here in Western Europe that you have to stop buying Russian gas. From you money has bought weapons, which are now being used in Ukraine. For years you have looked the other way. France, Italy and Germany even sold weapons to Russia.”
Don’t call her departure from Russia a flight
Aljochina made the international press in mid-May with her spectacular escape from the apartment where she was under house arrest. She decided to cut her anklet, leave her phone at home and, dressed in a green meal delivery man suit, slipped out the back door of the apartment complex where she was under house arrest.
She explicitly calls her departure from Russia not a flight. “I want to make my voice heard, that’s why I’m here. We’re on a 21-day tour. I want to be with the band, sing our new anti-war song. I don’t know what I’m going to do next.”
The band Pussy Riot has been warning for years against the crimes committed by Putin and his clique in the Kremlin. In 2012, Alyochina and her fellow band members were sentenced to two years in a penal camp for protesting the omnipotence of the Russian leader by singing the song Mother of God, deliver us from Putin to play in a church.
After their release from the penal camp, they announced that they would stop performing. They did start an organization that stood up for human rights activists in Russia.
Since then, the members of Pussy Riot have continued to protest and have been regularly arrested. Aljochina has been arrested six times since last July alone, each time for no real reason. “We call it the arrest carousel,” says Aljochina. “We get arrested, they take us to a police station, and then it turns out we’ve ‘resisted’ something and we go to jail for two weeks.”
In February, Alyochina was arrested over a post on Instagram criticizing Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko. The judge ruled that it was “Nazi propaganda”. Alyochina: “For years I protested against the Nazis and now according to Putin I am one of them? Just like the entire Ukrainian people?”
‘We knew it was going to be a terrible time’
Alyochina was alone in a cell when Putin gave a lengthy speech on Feb. 21, accusing Ukraine of harboring neo-Nazis and preparing attacks on Russia. She heard the speech on the radio, and was furious, all alone in that cell. “Everyone knew we were going to have a terrible time, and there’s nothing you can do about it. And it’s even worse: the reports of the rapes, the murders come in every day.”
On February 22, a day after Putin’s speech, Alyochina was released and placed under house arrest. She was then detained for another fifteen days, and was again placed under house arrest. The situation became increasingly difficult. Especially after the introduction of a new law that could put Kremlin critics in prison for 15 years if they spread “fake news” according to the authorities.
At the beginning of May, the Pussy Riot singer managed to escape, in her disguise. With the help of a Western embassy (she won’t say which one) she got the right papers and was eventually able to cross the border between Belarus and Lithuania without any problems.
Money for Ukrainian children’s hospital
During this tour, Pussy Riot is raising money for the children’s hospital in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, where victims of Russian bombings lie. Also , part of the proceeds from the sale of merchandise will go to Ukraine .
Alyochina would like to go to Ukraine herself, but she does not know whether she is welcome there as a Russian at the moment. “This war has left deep wounds and will probably take generations to heal.”
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