SpaceWar.com reports: “A Russian court on Tuesday jailed a woman for more than five years for criticising the army on social media, allegedly after she was denounced by her neighbour.

Anna Aleksandrova, a 47-year-old hairdresser, was arrested in November 2023 over posts she made under a pseudonym on VKontakte, Russia’s largest social network.

Prosecutors accused her of giving information about how to avoid military mobilisation, and of posting information critical of Moscow’s Ukraine offensive.

Russia has opened hundreds of criminal cases against its citizens for spreading ‘fake news’ about the army since sending troops into Ukraine in February 2022.

Saint Petersburg’s Pushkinsky District Court gave her a prison sentence of five years and two months, and banned her from using social media for three years afterwards, the court’s press service said on Telegram.

Aleksandrova pleaded not guilty at the trial, saying she was set up by a neighbour with whom she was embroiled in a land dispute, according to the Mediazona news outlet…”