Happy birthday!

On March 2, Sergei Kovalev, one of the most famous Soviet dissidents, human rights activist, board member of the International Memorial Society, and author of the Daily Journal, turned 80 years old. Kovalev stood at the origins and was one of the leaders of the Initiative Group for the Defense of Human Rights in the USSR, created in 1969. In 1975, he was sentenced to seven years in maximum security camps and three years of exile for anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda. In 1990, he was elected as a people's deputy of the RSFSR and was a member of the Supreme Council of the RSFSR. From 1993 to 2003 - deputy of the State Duma. From 1993 to 1996 he headed the Human Rights Commission under the President, and from 1994 - the Mission of the Commissioner for Human Rights in the North Caucasus. He stopped cooperating with the Russian authorities in 1996, explaining that their policies were undemocratic, did not guarantee the rights and freedoms of citizens, and gravitated towards forceful methods of solving problems.