Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova of Pussy Riot were on "Today" Thursday morning for an interview with Matt Lauer; they discussed their time in prison and how the Russian state's efforts to repress them only emboldened their activism.
“The first thing I want to say is, I really, sincerely wanted Russia to be free,” Tolokonnikova told Lauer. “This idea we heard about free Russia, it only became stronger in our cells during the two years we were in jail. If our government thought that they were going to just break us down by jailing us, it didn't work out at all.”
Alyokhina and Tolokonnikova are in New York City for Tina Brown's “Women in the World Summit.”
Watch it here:
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