A RUSSIAN native has been sentenced to five years in prison in Ukraine for posting communist symbols on social media and showing support for the Soviet Union, authorities have confirmed. 

The unnamed woman was jailed in the western Ivano-Frankivsk region on Tuesday, according to a Ukrainian government website. 

She was found guilty of “propaganda and the public use of symbols of the communist totalitarian regime,” which is banned under the Criminal Code of Ukraine. 

Prosecutors proved to the court that the woman had used the banned social network VK, which is popular among Russian speakers, between 2019 and 2022. 

She had “systematically distributed, as well as publicly used materials depicting the symbols of the communist totalitarian regime” the court was told. 

The material posted over that period “popularised the ideas of revival and restoration of the USSR and justified the criminal regime and glorified Lenin and Stalin.”

The woman, who was not named by the authorities, was born in Russia, however, acquired Ukrainian citizenship in 2015 and lived in the western city of Ivano-Frankivsk.

Her support of communism was exposed by the regional Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and led to pre-trial investigations. 

Ukrainians have been encouraged to report and denounce each other for alleged “collaboration” with Russia. 

The Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine has issued guidance on how to write such a statement correctly, urging citizens to report collaborators using a chatbot. 

Nearly 2,000 “denunciations” have been received via that chatbot in the past four months and passed on to the SBU. 

The charge of collaboration carries a maximum 15-year jail sentence. 

The Communist Party of Ukraine was permanently banned last week and all its assets, including cash and buildings, were seized by the state. 

Ukraine used its controversial “decommunisation” laws to prohibit the party after years of court cases and legal arguments. 

The party’s newspaper Rabochaya Gazeta and website had already been closed down while its leader Petro Symonenko had been banned from standing in the 2019 presidential election. 

At least 14 opposition parties have now been shut down in Ukraine, most of them leftist organisations. 

All media outlets have been closed, except for one which is under the control of the government.