Russia's Investigative Committee said on July 16 it had launched an investigation into environmentalist Yevgenia Chirikova on a charge of distributing false information about Russia's military.
According to the committee, the charge against Chirikova stems from a video she placed online, which "contained knowingly false information about the activities of the Russian Federation's armed forces against civilians in Ukraine."
The statement added that Chirikova is also suspected of facilitating terrorism.
Chirikova is a leading Russian environmentalist who fled Russia in April 2015.
She has been known for her environment activities since 2010, when she led a campaign to prevent a highway to St. Petersburg from being built through part of the Moscow region's Khimki Forest.
Chirikova helped create the Defenders of Khimki Forest group in 2010 to work against the highway project and initially had success halting the project as the government promised to do environmental-impact studies.
In January, the Russian Justice Ministry added Chirikova to its list of "foreign agents."
In late April, a court in Russia's Komi Republic issued arrests warrants for Chirikova and several other self-exiled opposition politicians, including former world chess champion Garry Kasparov, former Russian lawmaker Gennady Gudkov, and Ivan Tyutrin.
The four politicians are members of the Council of the Free Russia Forum established in Lithuania in 2016.
In February last year, the Russian Prosecutor-General's Office recognized the Free Russia Forum as an "undesirable organization." The "undesirable organization" law, adopted in 2015, is a Kremlin-backed regulation on organizations that receive funding from foreign sources.
The label has been applied to more than 170 organizations -- including media outlets such as RFE/RL, religious organizations, and NGOs involved in political, cultural, and educational activities -- since Moscow began using the classification.
It effectively bans the organizations outright.
Chirikova was awarded the Woman of Courage Award in 2011 by then-U.S. Vice President Joe Biden and the Goldman Environmental Prize in San Francisco.
She was arrested several times for her activities while in Russia, while several Khimki activists and journalists were beaten and harassed for their efforts to stop development within the Khimki Forest.