Pyotr Ivanov

Pyotr Ivanov is a Russian journalist with the independent outlet SOTA, where he works in the video department and produces field reports. He had faced violence and police pressure even before the current criminal case. On May 30, 2022, unidentified men attacked him near his home in St. Petersburg, breaking his nose. A criminal investigation was opened, but Ivanov later wrote that investigators effectively stopped pursuing the attackers.

The current prosecution concerns a reporting trip to the Sudzha district of Russia’s Kursk region in August 2024. At the time, Ukrainian forces controlled Sudzha and several surrounding settlements. Ivanov and fellow SOTA journalist Ruslan Terekhov traveled there to report on the lives of local Russian civilians.

The FSB later opened a case under Part 3 of Article 322 of the Russian Criminal Code, accusing the journalists of illegally crossing the Russian border as a group acting by prior agreement. According to SOTA and OVD-Info, the published video report itself became one of the principal pieces of evidence. Investigators questioned two residents of the Sudzha district and showed them footage in an effort to establish where it had been recorded.

The investigation followed a complaint submitted by State Duma deputy Oleg Matveychev to the Prosecutor General’s Office. Ivanov and Terekhov were placed on a wanted list on July 31, 2025.

On August 29, 2025, the Leninsky District Court in Kursk ordered Ivanov’s arrest in absentia. Russian authorities subsequently sought him on federal, interstate and international wanted lists and submitted an Interpol request. SOTA later reported that Interpol declined the Russian request.

On December 4, 2025, Ivanov was granted political asylum in Lithuania. No verdict has been issued in Russia, and he is not physically imprisoned.