Seventy-three-year-old Russian human rights activist Lyudmila Bogatenkova has been released from detention after two nights in jail in southern Russia, according to her lawyer.
Bogatenkova, chairwoman of the Budyonnovsk branch of the Soldiers Mothers Committee human-rights NGO, was released from custody in Stavropol on October 20 after signing a statement that she would not leave the country, the lawyer told journalists.
Bogatenkova faces charges of fraud stemming from four-year-old allegations of financial wrongdoing.
The chairman of Russia's presidential rights council, Mikhail Fedotov, said he is personally monitoring Bogatenkova's case.
Rights council member Sergei Krivenko told Interfax that Bogatenkova clearly presents no threat to society and that taking her into custody "looks like revenge for her human-rights activity."
In August, Bogatenkova handed over to the presidential rights council documentation connected with the alleged deaths of dozens of Russian soldiers near a military training camp in the Rostov region, near Russia's border with the separatist regions of eastern Ukraine.
The Soldiers' Mothers network has publicly alleged that Russian soldiers have died or been wounded in Ukraine and that thousands have served there during the past six months or so.
