Miss Russia draped naked in Russian flag challenged by state prosecutors

Prosecutors in Russia launched an investigation after the recently crowned Miss Russia was picture on the front of a glossy magazine draped in a Russian flag.

Under the headline The Taste of Victory, Sofia Nikitchuk, Miss Russia 2015, is pictured on the cover of lifestyle magazine Stolnik devoted to the 70th anniversary of the Soviet Victory over Nazi Germany seemingly draped naked in the white red and blue of the Russian Federation.

Editor-in-chief Anna Reshyotkina told the Moscow Times that shortly after the edition hit the shelves, she had been called into the prosecutors office in the Sverdlovsk region.

"I was called to the Prosecutor's Office for a half-hour conversation after which I had to write a statement saying who was responsible for the decision to use that cover. I took full responsibility for the decision," she said.

The magazine claimed that Miss Nikitchuk was in fact not draped in the country's flag, but in a dress in the same colours as the flag. On the magazine's website, the photograph had been replaced by one of Miss Nikitchuk in a red dress against the backdrop of the Russian flag.

Representatives of Miss Russia told Moskovskii Komsomolets that prosecutors had expressed no interest in pursuing charges.

Miss Nikitchuk said that she intended no offense by taking part in the photoshoot.

"I love my country and respect its symbols," she declared.

Nikitchuk won her local Miss Ekaterinburg beauty contest in 2014 before claiming the national title in April, and was also awarded 3 million rubles ($60,000; £38,000) and a car.

The desecration of the Russian flag is a criminal offence that carries a year-long jail sentence in Russia.

In 2013, US band the Bloodhound Gang were banned from Russia when one of their members stuffed a Russian flag down his trousers at a gig in Ukraine.

Recently, three women in Novorossiysk were jailed for twerking in front of a Russian war memorial.