Meet Ilya Novikov, the Russian-born lawyer and sharp Zelensky critic helping to defend the Ukrainian man accused of bombing the Nord Stream pipeline

Defense attorney Ilya Novikov moved from Russia to Ukraine in 2019.

Back home, he has been sentenced in absentia to eight and a half years in prison for spreading ”fake news,” labeled a “foreign agent,” added to the registry of “terrorists and extremists,” and put on a wanted list in a separate criminal case — on treason charges for fighting on Ukraine’s side.

Now, as a Ukrainian lawyer, Novikov is defending Serhii Kuznetsov, a Ukrainian citizen who was detained in connection with the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines and later extradited to Germany.

Novikov is also handling several cases for former President Petro Poroshenko, and he is a critic of President Volodymyr Zelensky’s policies.

(Zelensky and Poroshenko have a long-running feud.) Meduza asked Novikov about his criticisms of Zelensky and his administration, and why he thinks Ukraine’s government imposed sanctions on Poroshenko. ...