Russia: They threw Molotov cocktails at the city hall as a sign of protest against mobilization, sentenced to 19 years in prison each

The court in Yekaterinburg, Russia, today sentenced to 19 years in prison a former soldier and a former rescuer who threw Molotov cocktails at the city hall in protest of the mobilization for the war in Ukraine.

This is the heaviest sentence so far imposed for this type of attack on official facilities, which have been increasing throughout Russia since the invasion of Ukraine began.

Two men, Roman Nasriyev and Alexei Nuriyev, were convicted by a military court in the Ural city of Yekaterinburg for a "terrorist act" committed as part of an organized group, the state news agency TASS said.

As stated by the prosecutors, Nasrijev and Nurijev, as persons engaged in the National Guard and the Ministry of Emergency Situations, broke a window on the ground floor of the city hall in Bakal, a small town in the Chelyabinsk region, in the middle of October in the middle of the night.

Then they threw several bottles with flammable substances inside, but there were no victims and no major damage was caused to this building, which also housed the military recruitment center.

The two defendants did not deny the facts, but rejected any mention of a terrorist act, claiming that they wanted to condemn the Russian military campaign in Ukraine.

"I just wanted to show that there are people in our city who are against mobilization and 'special military operations' in Ukraine," Nuriev said during the trial, according to the NGO Solidarity Zone.

The two convicts have been friends for many years, and played together in a rock band, Russian media reports.

Dozens of similar anti-war attacks on public buildings have been reported in Russia since the attack on Ukraine began, but the charges and sentences handed down have so far been milder.

The Russian authorities have equipped themselves with a large legislative arsenal to punish anyone who opposes the invasion.

Hundreds of activists or anonymous ordinary people who expressed their opposition to the war have already been sentenced to fines or prison terms.