By Sergei Khazov-Cassia and Robert Coalson

MOSCOW – Yulia Tsvetkova, a feminist activist in the Far Eastern city of Komsomolsk-on-Amur, has been placed under house arrest for two months, ordered to wear an ankle bracelet, and barred from communicating with anyone except her mother and her lawyer. But that might not be the worst of her ordeal.

"The craziest persecution is going on now," Tsvetkova’s mother, Anna Khodyryeva, told RFE/RL in a telephone interview about her daughter, who has been charged with distributing pornography. "In local online forums and in the comments sections, people are writing that we should be killed or crucified. Yulia is afraid for my life whenever I go out.

Khodyryeva believes the online assault against Tsvetkova is not really a local phenomenon but was was incited by a St. Petersburg man named Timur Bulatov, a self-proclaimed defender of "traditional values" who has been investigated by the Interior Ministry's anti-extremism unit for his efforts to identify gay teens and outing them to police and schools. Read more via RFERL