Prominent human rights lawyer flees Russia to escape criminal charges related to treason case

Ivan Pavlov, the human rights lawyer charged with leaking classified trial data from a treason case against a former journalist, has fled Russia. On Telegram, Pavlov announced that he’s now in Georgia and hopes to return home, one day. The various restrictions he faced because of the charges against him, Pavlov explained, “gradually made [his] work impossible.” Courts prohibited him from using the Internet and speaking to his own clients and many of his own colleagues.

Pavlov founded the “Team 29” human rights organization in 2014, which specialized in defending suspects accused of treason and espionage. The team represented defendants in several high-profile cases, including the “extremism” case against Alexey Navalny’s political and anti-corruption organizations and the spying case against Karina Tsurkan, an executive with energy holding company Inter RAO.

In July 2021, the organization disbanded after the Russian Attorney General’s Office ordered local Internet service providers to start blocking Team 29’s website.