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A court in Ukraine's Russian-occupied region of Crimea has jailed and fined several local residents for playing a popular Ukrainian song, Chervona Kalyna (Red Viburnum), at a wedding party.
The Bakhchysaray district court said on September 14 that six people were either fined 50,000 rubles ($820) or sentenced to jail terms of between five and 15 days for using "a combatant song for Ukrainian nationalists" at a wedding party.
The court statement said that the text of the song contains words discrediting Russia's armed forces.
The song in question has turned into a patriotic song in Ukraine and is often used by Ukrainians and those who support them in their fight against Russia's unprovoked invasion.
Russia's state-run Krym 24 news agency said the owner of the Arpat restaurant in the Crimean city of Bakhchysaray, where the wedding party was held on September 10, was handed 15 days in jail, while a DJ and a woman who attended the wedding party were sentenced to 10 days in jail each. The bridegroom's mother received five days in jail from the court.
The agency also said that the bride's mother and the wife of the restaurant owner were ordered to pay 50,000 rubles in fines each.
Last month, a local DJ was sentenced to 10 days in jail for playing a video of a song by Ukrainian rapper Yarmak.
