Garri Azarian

The joint press service of the courts of St. Petersburg reported that, according to the investigation, from 3 January to 27 February 2025 Azarian, as a member of the left-wing radical community "Workers Power", spoke at a congress of its members, publicly justifying violent seizure of power in Russia and mass murder. His speech was stenographed and the transcripts were published for viewing in a cloud storage on Google drive. The media "78" and the channel "Mash na Moike" report with reference to sources in the law enforcement agencies that the student called for murders "to draw attention to the activities of the "Workers Power" cell" at the meetings of "left-radicals." The young man "planned to use other students as "infantry" to carry out "direct action." "Slovo Zashchite" and "Mediazona" write that the case was initiated because of the recording of Azarian's speech at the meeting of left-wing activists, which was saved in cloud storage by the activists themselves. According to "Slovo Zashchite," in this speech the student theorised on the necessity of destroying capitalism through revolution, essentially reciting the "Internationale," and expressed the hope that the revolution would be accompanied by killings of "exploiters." He saw the task of leftist activists as explaining to the "masses" that their main enemies are "the exploiters." At the same time, "Mediazona," according to a source familiar with the speech, reports that Azarian only stated that the revolution is accompanied by violence and in such a situation "people will take to the streets and kill"; and emphasised that "our task is not to incite hatred, we are not extremists. Our task is to explain to people that capitalism is to blame."