As reported by AFP, on Monday in Odintsovo, on the western outskirts of Moscow, the trial of an 18-year-old student, the youngest Russian to stand trial for spreading “false information” about the Russian military, began.

Maxim Lipkan, who faces up to 10 years in prison, was arrested in February after his 18th birthday as he planned to stage a protest against Russia’s offensive in Ukraine.

The meeting was held behind closed doors and without the presence of the accused, who was hospitalized in a psychiatric hospital in Chekhov, not far from the Russian capital, on Friday at the request of the court.

“The trial will be held behind closed doors because, according to the opinion of the expert (forensic medical examination), he was found partially not responsible for his actions,” his lawyer Alan Kachmazov, who was present at the hearing, told AFP.

According to Kachmazov, his client is accused of spreading “false information about the Russian military”, telling on his Telegram and YouTube channel about “a famous maternity hospital (in Ukraine), which, according to Maxim, was bombed by the Russian military”. .

“We are very worried about Maxim,” said his mother Olena before the hearing.

According to another lawyer Maksym Antonina Levochska, during the pretrial detention the young man was “forced to shave” and he had “conflicts with his cell neighbors.”

The defense hopes that Maxim will be released due to an undisclosed diagnosis.

An anti-offensive fighter, he had just finished school and was going to study law at university to become a lawyer.

Before his arrest, Maksym Lipkan planned to organize a protest on February 24 on the occasion of the second anniversary of the beginning of the Russian intervention in Ukraine called “Year of Hell”, but the authorities banned this gathering.

The police arrived at his door at six o’clock on February 21 and arrested him. The next meeting is scheduled for Wednesday.