Notes At The Front

Nadine Geisler worked as a photographer in Belgorod, a city close to the border with Ukraine. In February 2022, after the war began, a former client from Ukraine wrote to her for help: her mother was about to cross the border into Belgorod Oblast and had no idea where to go. As Nadine told the BBC’s Russian language service in 2022, she met the mother, as well as others coming from Ukraine, at the border and brought several families to her one-bedroom apartment. After this experience, she began to work as a volunteer helping Ukrainians with evacuations from dangerous areas to Russia and Europe, as well as distributing food and medical supplies and managing a network of several dozen volunteers.

Geisler was arrested in 2024 for allegedly posting an online appeal for donations to Azov, a Ukrainian organization banned in Russia. Geisler denied that the account belonged to her. She was eventually sentenced to 22 years in prison for treason and abetting terrorism. We publish excerpts of Nadine’s last statement in the courtroom, where Russians are given the opportunity to contest the case against them. Despite attempts to limit this tradition, it remains one of the country’s only platforms for free speech.

Here, we offer an abridged translation of Geisler’s Last Word: