Fact Check: Putin’s call for death penalty over burning Quran in Russia is fake news
There has been a moratorium on capital punishment in Russia since 1996, as per Amnesty International and The Spectator.
By Md Mahfooz Alam Published on 23 Jun 2023 1:33 PM GMT
Screengrab of Instagram post
Hyderabad: A graphic featuring Vladimir Putin and Hindi text attributed to the Russian President states that those accused of burning the Quran in Russia will be awarded the death penalty, as per the Sharia law.
(Source: Instagram)
Click here to see the post.
Fact Check
NewsMeter, in its investigation, found that the claim is false. We ran a keyword search and came across a report by TASS, Russia’s state-owned news agency, from June 13. According to it, Putin said that criminal cases of Quran burning will be investigated by the Chechnya investigators.
He also said the accused will be sent to Russia’s majority-Muslim republic of Chechnya to serve the punishment. The report also mentioned a 19-year-old boy Nikita Zhuravel, who was detained for allegedly burning Quran outside a Cathedral Mosque in Volgograd. A criminal case was initiated by the Investigative Department of the Volgograd Region and was transferred to the Investigative Department of the Chechen Republic. There is no mention of a death penalty ruling in the report.
Similarly, the Middle East Monitor on June 14 reported that Putin’s statement came after Nikita Zhuravel was detained for allegedly burning a copy of the Quran in front of a mosque.
As per The Moscow Times, lawyers and activists were apprehensive about the decision to transfer Zhuravel’s case to Chechen investigators as it puts him at risk of torture or even death. Chechnya, which is ruled by Ramzan Kadyrov, has a long history of human rights abuses.
Is capital punishment allowed in Russia?
There has been a moratorium on capital punishment since 1996, as per Amnesty International and The Spectator.
However, there has been a demand to reinstate capital punishment. As per the TASS report of December 2022, Putin is against the reinstatement of capital punishment.
It has quoted Putin saying, “As for the death penalty, Constitutional Court Chairman Valery Zorkin recently spoke about it at the convention of judges. And he said in response to those who are advocating the reinstatement of the death penalty that in order to do so, the constitution will have to be amended. Therefore, my stance has not changed.”
Hence, we conclude that the claim that Putin has announced the death penalty for those accused of burning the Quran in Russia is false.
