Freedom of association
Transparency International declared “undesirable”
On 6th March, the General Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation designated the international non-governmental organization Transparency International as "undesirable." The official statement from the General Prosecutor's Office asserted that the NGO had engaged in activities that “clearly extend beyond declared goals and objectives” and interfered in the internal affairs of the Russian Federation, posing a threat to the foundational structure and security of the country. Transparency International is known for its research on corruption and its global efforts to combat this issue.
“Undesirable” organisations are prohibited by law from opening departments or branches on Russian territory, from distributing material physically or online, and from carrying out their projects in the country. Sharing materials of organisations classified as “undesirable” on social networks, funding them or collaborating with them is punishable by administrative and criminal sanctions.
Transparency International’s Russian branch was labelled a "foreign agent" in 2015. Seven years later, in October 2022, its leader, Ilya Shumanov, received the same designation.
Activists’ homes and offices raided
In March, the authorities increased their harassment of activists associated with Memorial, Russia's oldest human rights organisation and winner of the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize, which was liquidated in 2022. As OVD-Info reports, between 11th and 13th March, the homes of volunteers and staff of the organisation's Perm branch were raided. One volunteer was taken for questioning and held for two days while his electronic devices were confiscated. In addition, on 11th and 12th March, security forces carried out searches at the flat of Alexander Chernyshov, Chair of the Perm Centre for Historical Memory, and at the organisation's office. During these operations, neither the volunteer nor Chernyshov were presented with search warrants or relevant documents. Human rights activists observed that the main concern of the authorities appeared to be to bring the archives of the Perm "Memorial" to Moscow for safekeeping after the dissolution of the organisation.
In November 2021, the Prosecutor's Office filed lawsuits with the Moscow City Court to dissolve the Memorial Human Rights Centre and with the Supreme Court to dissolve the Memorial International Society. The reason for these lawsuits was the organisation's alleged numerous violations of the law on "foreign agents". On 28th December, the Supreme Court dissolved the Memorial International Society, followed by a similar decision by the Moscow City Court regarding the Memorial Human Rights Centre on 29th December.
Freedom of peaceful assembly
Anti-war protests across multiple cities, over 50 people detained
On 24th February, a series of protest actions unfolded in numerous cities across Russia to commemorate the anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As reported by DW, individuals either conducted solitary pickets or laid flowers near statues of Ukrainian writers. Only a handful of people took part in each action, and deliberate attempts were made to avoid large gatherings. Opposition movements and activists did not plan to hold any mass events due to the almost inevitable risk of dispersal and detention of protest participants.
Nevertheless, dozens of people were detained for these peaceful anti-war protests. In Moscow, residents laid flowers near the statue of Lesya Ukrainka. The police at first only observed without intervening, but then began to make arrests. Protest observer OVD-Info reported that police officers arrested at least three women for bringing flowers to the monument. Similar incidents were also documented in Saint Petersburg, the BBC reported. According to the same source, no fewer than 15 people were arrested in Saint Petersburg while paying their respects at the Taras Shevchenko monument. In Ekaterinburg, eight people were taken into custody.
According to protest watchdog OVD-Info, 54 people were detained in total. Saint Petersburg had the most detentions (18), followed by Yekaterinburg with 11 detentions, Moscow with 7 detentions, and Nizhnii Novgorod and Barnaul with 4 detentions each. According to OVD-Info, detentions took place in 14 cities across Russia.
Freedom of expression
Journalist sentenced to six years in prison for sharing information about airstrike
On 15th February, a court in Barnaul, Siberia, found journalist Maria Ponomarenko guilty of spreading false information about the Russian military. She was sentenced to six years in prison and banned from practising journalism for five years. Ponomarenko's legal representative, Dmitriy Shitov, told the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) that the journalist plans to appeal the sentence. She is currently in pre-trial detention while her appeal is processed.
Ponomarenko, who works as a correspondent for the independent news outlet RusNews, has been detained in Russia since April 2022. She is accused of using a now-defunct Telegram channel to spread “false information” about a Russian airstrike in Mariupol, Ukraine, for which the Russian authorities deny responsibility.
Journalist Andrei Navashov sentenced to 8 months of community service
On 6th March, a court in the Siberian region of Kemerovo sentenced journalist Andrei Novashov to 8 months of corrective work. He was accused of distributing "fake news" about Russian armed forces and sentenced to 8 months of corrective work and prohibited from engaging in journalistic activities for a year. His lawyer has announced they would appeal the decision, as Novashov completely denies any wrongdoing.
In 2022, authorities in Kemerovo arrested Novashov, a reporter associated with Radio Free Europe's project Sibir.Realii on charges of disseminating "fake" information. The allegations against Novashov stem from a post he made on March 10 on the Russian social media platform VKontakte. In the post, he shared an eyewitness account of Russian attacks and the siege of the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol, which had originally been posted on Facebook by a journalist in Mariupol.
On 1st March, OVD-Info reported on a new legislative initiative to expand the scope of the law criminalising discrediting the army. According to the human rights organisation, a new draft law has been submitted to the State Duma for consideration. If adopted, it would add defamation of “volunteers", such as mercenary groups participating in the war in Ukraine, to the existing provisions criminalising criticism of the Russian forces, carrying a potential prison sentence of 15 years. According to OVD-Info, 33 similar laws have already been passed since the beginning of the war.
TV Rain journalists remain on "foreign agent" list
On 1st March, the Moscow Zamoskvoretsky District Court rejected the request to remove Tikhon Dzyadko, the editor-in-chief of independent online channel TV Rain, from the register of "foreign agents". Similar decisions were taken with regard to Vladimir Romensky and Natalya Zindeyeva. The same day, the Moscow City Court ruled against removing Maria Borzunova, a former journalist at TV Rain, from the register of "foreign agents".
Tikhon Dzyadko was added to the list of persons classified as "foreign agents" on 14th October 2022. His colleagues Natalya Zindeyeva and Vladimir Romensky were also classified as "foreign agents" on 28th October of the same year. The TV Rain channel was classified as a "foreign agent" in August 2022, and the media company ceased its operations in Russia in March of the same year. At a briefing on Dzyadko’s status, his lawyer Vasily Kushnir noted that the file contains no evidence of foreign funding for the journalist. For his part, the representative of the Ministry of Justice stated that these exist but are classified as “secret”, so he cannot present them.