Russia’s Interior Ministry has issued an arrest warrant for rapper Face, the exiled news outlet Mediazona reported Friday.
Authorities have not disclosed the charges against the 27-year-old musician, whose real name is Ivan Dremin. He was labeled a “foreign agent” in 2022 and has since been fined multiple times for failing to comply with the restrictions that status entails.
Face left Russia shortly after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. At the time, he announced he would stop performing in Russia and would remove his music from the country’s streaming platforms.
The rapper rose to fame in 2017 with the viral music video “Burger,” which garnered more than 30 million views on YouTube. His 2018 album “Mysterious Ways” marked a shift toward politically charged themes, taking aim at poverty, corruption and abuse in Russia’s prison system.
Face had been a public supporter of the late opposition activist Alexei Navalny, attending several demonstrations backing the anti-Kremlin figure.
His latest album, “God of Rap,” was released in June 2024.
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