INTERNATIONAL: A Russian woman who denounced the Russian offensive in Ukraine during a live news bulletin on state television was fined $280 on Tuesday ,March 15, a court has said, after the Kremlin has denounced her act of protest as "hooliganism."

Marina Ovsyannikova, a Channel One employee, was found guilty of flouting protest laws, the court has said. It was not immediately clear if she could also face other, more serious charges. Her lawyer was not immediately reachable for comment.

Ovsyannikova has staged an extraordinary show of dissent on Monday night when she held up a sign behind a studio presenter reading the news on Channel One and has shouted slogans condemning Russia's February 24 offensive in Ukraine.

State TV, which beams the Kremlin's narrative into homes across Russia's 11 time zones, portrays the invasion as a "special military operation," brushing over the humanitarian crisis, damage to cities and the mounting death toll.

Ovsyannikova has exhorted Russians not to be taken in by state propaganda, a message that drew praise from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy but was swiftly rebuffed in Moscow.

"As far as this woman is concerned, this is hooliganism," said Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov. "The channel and those who are supposed to will get to the bottom of this," he told reporters, describing Channel One as a pillar of objective and timely news.

After the hearing, Ovsyannikova has told reporters she was exhausted, had been questioned for more than 14 hours, had not been allowed to speak to her relatives and was not provided with legal assistance. She has said she needed to rest before commenting further.

Her protest had stirred fears among her sympathisers that she could be prosecuted under new legislation that carries a jail term of up to 15 years.

The law has adopted eight days after the invasion of Ukraine makes public actions aimed at discrediting Russia's army illegal and bans the spread of fake news or the "public dissemination of deliberately false information" about the use of Russia's armed forces.

Officials in Moscow describe Russia's offensive in Ukraine as a special military operation to disarm the country and prevent "genocide" against Russian-speakers, a justification dismissed by Ukraine and the West as a false pretext for an invasion of a democratic country.

^{PHOTO: PROTESTER MARINA OVSYANNIKOVA LEAVING COURT BUILDING AND SPEAKING TO REPORTERS AFTER RECEIVING FINE FOR HER ON-AIR PROTEST DURING MAIN NIGHTLY NEWSCAST ON RUSSIAN CHANNEL ONE TELEVISION}