They came to the offices of Amnesty International and the “For Human Rights” movement in Moscow with an “unscheduled inspection”

On Monday, law enforcement officers came to check the Moscow offices of leading human rights organizations - the Russian representative office of Amnesty International and the For Human Rights movement.

“This is an unscheduled inspection,” Sergei Nikitin, head of the Russian branch of Amnesty International, told Interfax. According to him, employees of the prosecutor's office and the tax service came to his office. “They need copies of documents,” Nikitin said. Recently, the Ministry of Justice assured that Amnesty International was not on the list of organizations subject to inspection, Nikitin noted. He said that he regards what is happening as “pressure on civil society.”

“At 10.50, representatives of the Ministry of Justice, the prosecutor’s office, the tax office came - the whole set, including the NTV channel. Everyone refused to introduce themselves on camera. Lev Alexandrovich was not there, they demanded that we provide them with all the documents they needed - statutory, financial and others. Nobody gave them to them, the police were called, NTV was not allowed into the office at all, they walked nearby and filmed everything,” Ignor Bakirov, coordinator of the “For Human Rights” movement, told PublicPost. - When Lev Aleksandrovich arrived after 11, we accepted a letter - an appeal to the city prosecutor's office stating that we had already passed an inspection this year; in January we submitted the documents. Those who came, in turn, drew up a fake report stating that we refused to undergo inspection. Then they left the office. We are waiting for the reaction of the prosecutor’s office.”

In both cases, film crews from one of the TV channels came along with law enforcement officers.

Last week, law enforcement officials began checking the Memorial International Society and requested copies of about 600 documents related to the charter and financing of the organization. “An atmosphere is being created that paralyzes the normal work of our organization. This is state pressure on society,” Memorial head Arseny Roginsky told Interfax at the time.

On November 21, 2012, a law officially came into force in Russia requiring NPOs with foreign funding to register as “foreign agents.”

Interfax