On June 16, friends of Russian comic artist Tatyana Shchukina were detained in Yerevan. According to her own statement, this was done "on the orders of Russia." She told The Insider that this may be due to her anti-war position, and that a criminal case was being prepared against her in Russia.

Three days before the war, a person with connections in the authorities, who is very dear to me, told me that a case was being prepared against me and it was better for me to leave the country. I went first to Turkey, then to Armenia. They did not open a case against me, I am not on any wanted list. I was all this time in Armenia. All I did here was go to open mics and perform stand-ups. This morning my cohabitant friend got a call and was told it was the police. She was asked to come, but was not told on what subject. I knew that this was some kind of nonsense, but she went anyway - we are not in Russia. She was required to give out my contacts and location. She managed to write to me about this on Telegram, and then I deleted the correspondence with her and ran away from home. It turned out that it was just in time: my young man, who was also in the house, said that the police had come to him. He was also detained and taken somewhere.

At first they said that we were witnessing some kind of fight that we had never seen. Then it became quite obvious that the matter was political, because the guys no longer get in touch. They are being held for more than nine hours, I don’t know anything about them, the lawyers who went there say that this is some kind of incomprehensible crap.

Our interests are represented by different people. Agora human rights activist, member of the European Party of Armenia and Artur Sakunts. But no one has contacted me lately, I don't know what's going on. I know that the Investigative Committee of Armenia is lying. About the fact that they didn’t look for me at all, that they weren’t going to ask me anything, and that they didn’t ask anything about me. Because when there was still a connection with the guys, they convinced me that I needed to hide, because they would catch me now.

I believe that they wanted to open a criminal case against me in Russia for jokes and tweets about Putin, for my anti-war position. Apparently it's my fault for not shutting up. I continued to write anti-war posts, perform political stand-ups, participate in Ukrainian charity concerts, and so on. I'm sure they were offended that they let me go, and, in their opinion, I continued to do such crap. I think they want to hang a criminal case on me, arresting my friends. Either that they gave away my location, or that I myself come and surrender. And then extradite me to Russia, where a prison awaits me.

In Russia, I did not have any administrative cases, but there were hints of persecution for extremism. This was told to me by the same friend who helped me escape. Now he himself has escaped from Russia, I do not know where he is, I have no connection with him.

Minutes after Shchukina made the comment to The Insider, she tweeted that she had gone "give up."

Earlier, the head of the International Community for Human Rights in Armenia, Daavr Dorzhin, told The Insider that Shchukina's friends are indeed at the Erebuni district police station because of a criminal case that "is connected with an alleged crime in Armenia." “It [the criminal case] is connected with violence,” the lawyer added. According to him, "so far, the connection with Russia is not visible." “One of her friends was invited, the other was brought to the department,” Dorzhin said. They have lawyers and a translator.

Updated at 19:25 (Moscow time): The Insider sources said that one of Shchukina's friends was released from the police.

Updated at 22:10 (Moscow time): Shchukina later announced that all their accounts were blocked.