Russian court extends house arrest of Ukrainian library director

On August 15, the Moscow prosecutor's office refused to indict Sharina and returned the case to investigators without giving any reasons. Sharina was detained last October and charged with inciting extremism and ethnic hatred because her library's collection allegedly included books by Ukrainian ultranationalist and author Dmytro Korchynskiy, whose works are banned in Russia. She was placed under house arrest. In April, investigators charged Sharina with misallocating library funds, allegedly because she used library funds to pay for her legal defense in another extremism case against her that was dismissed in 2013. Her lawyer said the authorities had "trumped up" new charges after realizing their initial case against his client was too weak. Sharina has rejected all the allegations, saying they are politically motivated.