In a brave interview from her prison cell, Pussy Riot's Yekaterina Samutsevich has insisted the band will continue their fight for democracy in Russia. "We still burn with desire to take Putin's monopoly on power," she said, putting at risk the three women's chances of a more lenient sentence when their case goes to appeal.

Half a million people have already signed Avaaz's petition calling for EU sanctions on Russia to protest against Pussy Riot's imprisonment, and Russia's continued slide into dictatorship.

Regime has already 'failed miserably'

The women were arrested after the band performed an anti-Putin "punk prayer" in a major Moscow cathedral in March. Earlier this month a court found them guilty of hooliganism motivated by religious hatred and sentenced them to two years in a penal colony.

Samutsevich is being held in a separate cell from her band members. "We are mentally prepared [for jail]", she said. "We've already lived through the past five months relatively easily and the evil plan of our authorities, to jail us so as to break us and sour us, has already failed miserably."

Today's interview, published in the Guardian, came via written questions and answers passed through Samutsevich's lawyer. Here are the highlights:

"Of course we didn't expect a not-guilty verdict. To expect justice from a court that ignores all your objections is of course impossible. So we weren't shocked and, to the dismay of our enemies, didn't faint when we got the verdict. More than anything, our trial showed the dependence of the justice system, and its direct authority, on Putin's power, which clearly should not be the case in a government that calls itself democratic. Our verdict shows just how scared Putin's regime is of anyone who can undermine its legitimacy.

"This isn't surprising, because now only blind people can't see that since March 2012, Putin's regime has moved to direct repressive actions, starting with a major campaign against all dissenters, under which our group was one of the first to fall.

"The problem for Putin personally now is that a lot of people no longer see his strong hand and authority, but his fear and uncertainty in the face of the progressive citizens of Russia, who grow more and more numerous with every step like our verdict.

"What I can say for sure is that we still madly want changes in Russia – toward anti-authoritarian leftist ideas. We, along with many citizens of our country, are burning even more with the desire to finally take from Putin his monopoly on power, since his image no longer seems so total and terrible. In fact it is just an illusion, created by his spin doctors on government television channels."