MOSCOW. July 2 (Interfax) - A military appeals court has set a hearing for July 22 to review the conviction of Andy Stone, a citizen of the United States and spokesperson for the Meta corporation (designated as an extremist organization and banned from operating Facebook and Instagram in Russia), who has been sentenced to six years in prison in absentia for justifying terrorism, the court told Interfax.
"The court hearing is scheduled for 10:00 a.m. on July 22," the court said.
Defense lawyer Valentina Filippenkova, who represented Stone in the proceedings at the lower court, told Interfax earlier that the defense team sought Stone's acquittal.
On April 22, the Second Western Military Court sentenced Stone in absentia to six years in a general-security penitentiary on counts of justifying terrorism. The court prohibited Stone from administering websites for four years.
Stone will begin serving his sentence the moment he is detained in Russia or is extradited to Russia.
The Russian Prosecutor General's Office said earlier that Stone's post on Twitter, currently known as X, published in March 2022 "justified aggressive, hostile and violent actions against service members of the Russian Armed Forces participating in the special military operation."
"The material also contained public calls to commit acts of terrorism aimed at causing death to service members," investigators said. However, the prosecutor asked the court to exclude this from the charges.
Russia put Stone on the international wanted list and issued a warrant for his arrest in absentia.
On March 21, 2022, Moscow's Tverskoi District Court upheld a motion from the Russian Prosecutor General's Office for banning the distribution of Meta Platforms Inc. products, social networks, in Russia for reasons of extremism. The court ruling does not apply to the WhatsApp messenger of Meta, which does not publicly disseminate information.
Access to Facebook and Instagram in Russia is currently restricted.