Pussy Riot’s two recently amnestied members said on Friday they would team up with other activists, including Alexei Navalny, opposition leader, to create a new human rights group, while continuing their punk political protests against President Vladimir Putin. 
 
 In their first press conference, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina claimed Mr Putin had decided to grant them amnesty, and release them three months early, merely to appease western critics ahead of his “beloved” Winter Olympics in February and that a further crackdown by the regime could take place once the games were over. 
 
 “The thaw that people are referring to now doesn’t exist. The regime is only taking one step back under pressure from society,” Ms Tolokonnikova told reporters in a press conference broadcast on Russia’s leading opposition network. 
 
 “If we are grateful to anyone for our release, it’s not the president or the Duma, but our supporters. The Olympics are nearing and Putin doesn’t want anything to ruin his beloved project.” 
 
 Ms Tolokonnikova and Ms Alyokhina shot to fame in March 2012 after they and three other members of Pussy Riot, a punk band meets political activist group, performed their song “Mother of God, Drive Putin Out!” in Moscow’s Christ the Saviour Cathedral dressed in bright clothing and balaclavas. 
 
 While two of the band members were never identified, Ms Tolokonnikova, Ms Alyokhina and another bandmate Yekaterina Samutsevich were put on trial and handed two-year prison sentences for hooliganism. During the women’s appeal trial, Ms Samutsevich was unexpectedly given a suspended sentence and released, prompting some of the band’s supporters to publicly question if she had struck a deal with the Kremlin for her freedom. 
 
 In their press conference, Ms Tolokonnikova and Ms Alyokhina were careful to defend Ms Samutsevich and said she would be invited to take part in their new non-government organisation dedicated to improving prisoners’ rights, but offered no evidence that they still remained close to her. 
 
 They insisted that Pussy Riot would continue to exist and perform as a group, with membership well beyond the five women who had taken part in the church demonstration, but that the group had no plans to tour internationally. 
 
 FT Video Pussy Riot punk trio found guilty August 2012: Daniel Garrahan reports on the reaction to the Pussy Riot trial 
 
 They admitted that while at one time they had considered using the Pussy Riot brand to raise money for charitable causes, they had decided against it and would use crowd-sourced funding for their new organisation called “Zone of Law”, which would help individuals in the Russian prison system. 
 
 “In the penal colonies, there are people who are on the brink of life and death,” said Ms Alyokhina, who at times appeared to choke up while talking about her fellow inmates. 
 
 Mr Navalny will be on the group’s organisational committee and the women said they hoped that Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the oil tycoon who was also recently granted amnesty, would take part as well. 
 
 According to a recent survey by the Levada Centre, Russia’s most respected independent pollster, close to half of Russians support a new federal amnesty law, which in December granted freedom to 2,000 prisoners, including Pussy Riot and 30 Greenpeace activists. 
 
 However, a significant percentage of respondents said that the government had been wrong to release Pussy Riot early, a sign of how much the group’s performance angered certain Russians, specifically Orthodox believers. 
 
 While 41 per cent said they agreed with Pussy Riot’s amnesty, 40 per cent of respondents did not – a significantly higher figure than those who said they disagreed with the early release of Mr Khodorkovsky and the Greenpeace activists. ||||| In Moscow press conference, recently freed members of Pussy Riot cite plans to form human rights organization focusing on prisoners 
 
 Members of the Russian punk band Pussy Riot Maria Alyokhina, left, and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova. (Photo: Alexander Roslyakov, AP) 
 
 In their first press conference since being released from prison Dec. 23, two members of the group Pussy Riot said Friday that they planned to form a human rights organization focusing on the protection of prisoners. 
 
 Billboard reports that Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina told reporters in Moscow that they will call the group "Zona Prava" – which translates to "justice zone" – and that they hope to collaborate with former tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who was also freed last week after serving a 10-year jail term. 
 
 But Tolokonnikova added, "We won't ask anyone for financial assistance," noting that they hoped to work with Khodorkovsky "on an ideological level." The group would be financed by crowd-funding. 
 
 The musicians, who were serving two-year sentences for a "punk prayer" opposing Russian President Vladimir Putin, delivered in 2012, don't plan to play any shows to raise money. "We are not Pussy Riot now," Tolokonnikova said, though Alyokhina added that the band's third member, Yekaterina Samutsevich, who was released on probation in October 2012, is welcome to join them in their efforts. 
 
 "If she wants to help us with what we are doing now, we will only be glad," Alyokhina said. 
 
 She and Tolokonnikova also repeated their call for Western counties to boycott the Olympics. "Human rights activities in Russia are inevitably linked to politics," Alyokhina noted. 
 
 But the musicians said they don't have any firm political plans right now. "I wouldn't rule out political plans, but in the near future we will be focused on human rights activities," Tolokonnikova said. 
 
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– Two newly released members of Pussy Riot tell the New York Times that they're kicking around the idea of running for political office in Russia. Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, currently visiting the US as part of an international tour, also made clear that they have no intentions of tamping down their outspoken ways. “This is certainly not the time for us to be afraid," says Tolokonnikova. "The situation in Russia has gotten so much worse. And if we couldn’t keep quiet about it then, then we certainly won’t keep quiet about it now." Alyokhina adds that the support they received from around the world made them feel free even while imprisoned. “In light of that, it’s kind of silly to talk about having to go through that a second time as something that would instill fear in us.” The interview is fairly routine stuff, but not-so-routine was their visit to the Colbert Report, where Stephen Colbert "met his quick-witted match," observes Mediaite. Sample response when asked about Vladimir Putin: "We have different ideas about a bright future, and we don't want a shirtless man on a horse leading us" into that future. Watch it here.