Thread by @khodorkovsky_en

Russian sixth-grader Masha Moskaleva drew an anti-war picture at school. Her father went to prison for it.

🧵They escaped Russia and applied for German protection. Germany said no.

It began with a child's drawing in 2022. Rather than seeing a child's expression, her school principal saw sedition in it and reported it to the police. This immediately activated the repressive state machinery.

Authorities didn't target the child directly. Instead, they went after her single father, Alexey Moskalev. They dug through his social media for "evidence" of disloyalty to the regime and found what they wanted. Alexey was charged with "discrediting" the Russian army over social media posts.

While awaiting trial, he was placed under house arrest and separated from his daughter. She was placed in the custody of social services.

On March 28, 2023, after just one day of proceedings, a Russian court sentenced Alexey to two years in prison. They clearly sought to make an example of Alexey: if you oppose the war, even passively, be ready to lose everything—your freedom, your family, even your life.

Luckily, the night before his sentencing, Alexey fled house arrest. For a brief moment, there was hope. But the network of repression stretches beyond Russia's borders, and Putin's allies in Belarus were there to assist.

Alexey made a fatal mistake and turned on his cell phone while in Minsk, Belarus. The Belarusian KGB quickly located and arrested him. His lawyer, Dmitry Zakhvatov, believes the operation was "carried out at the highest level" with direct FSB involvement. "The command to arrest Moskalev came from the very top," he said. A father's fate warranted attention from the highest echelons of power.

Moskalev served one year and 10 months in a penal colony because his original two-year sentence was reduced by two months after a court-ordered examination found "discreditation" in only three of five social media posts, not all five as initially claimed.

Alexey was finally released in October 2024, having served his sentence. But freedom was an illusion. While in the penal colony, FSB agents had given him a warning: "Don't think that when your sentence ends, we'll leave you alone. We'll be with you for life now."

Within days of his return home, police were already at his door. Realizing they could never live a normal life, Alexey and Masha made the decision to flee Russia for good, leaving almost everything they had behind.

With the help of human rights activists, they made their way to Germany in late October 2024. There, they applied for protection through a special humanitarian admission program (under Section 23 of the Residence Act) created specifically for Russians facing political persecution.

Germany considered their high-profile case for months. But in a devastating turn, their application was rejected in the summer of 2025. The reason wasn't that their story wasn't believed; it was a matter of timing and bureaucracy.

Unbeknownst to them, the German government had quietly stopped accepting new applications for that specific humanitarian program in the spring of 2024, months before they even arrived. Their application was submitted to a program that no longer existed for new entries.

The reality is that opposing Putin's regime carries an enormous personal cost: prison, loss of career, family separation, exile. Western countries have said they'll support those who pay this price. Alexey paid his price.

After surviving a Russian prison and a harrowing escape, he and his daughter are now stuck in legal limbo.

They're not looking for handouts or trying to be a burden on anyone. They could have contributed to their own country and will contribute to whatever nation takes them in.

I think they deserve better. Don't you?