Pussy Riot members set to learn their fate

Three women from the punk band Pussy Riot could face sentence this week in a trial over their “protest prayer” in a church that has transfixed Russia and opened president Vladimir Putin to new accusations of a crackdown on dissent.

The first week of hearings divided the mainly Russian Orthodox country. Some believers want tough sentences but many others called for leniency, even though few approve of the unsanctioned performance at the altar of Moscow’s main church.

The trial for hooliganism, punishable by up to seven years in jail, resumes today in the same Moscow courtroom where oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky faced the second of two trials after defying Putin by taking an interest in politics.