Unlawful anti-extremism in April 2014

We publish an overview of the main and the most significant events in the field of misuse anti-extremist legislation in Russia in April 2014.

Rulemaking

On April 29, the Federation Council approved several bills that, in our opinion, will lead to a restriction of the rights and freedoms, increased pressure on society and an increase in the number of cases of illegal persecution of citizens, one way or another connected with the action of anti-extremist legislation.

The so-called "anti-terrorism bill" once again tightens punishment for terrorist activities, but also and for other crimes. In particular, punishment under Art. 212 of the Criminal Code (mass riots) increases from 4–10 to 8–15 years in prison. The composition is also changing. article, not only the organization, but also the preparation of mass riots is punishable, and list of means, the use of which during the riots entails criminal prosecution (firearms, explosives, explosive devices) is supplemented with " substances and objects, dangerous to others ." Punishment also follows " the acquisition of knowledge, practical skills and abilities in the course of classes on physical and psychological preparation "for the organization of mass unrest. In addition, additions are made to Art. 282.1 (organization extremist community) and 282.2 (organization of activities of an extremist organizations), which will provide for liability (from one year to six years' imprisonment) for solicitation, recruitment or other involvement persons "into the work of an extremist organization. At the same time FSB officers will receive the right to personal search and check of documents not all suspects, as was originally intended, but only those citizens whom are suspected of committing crimes and offenses under investigation by the FSB.

The "law on bloggers" was also approved, which amends information and communications laws to strengthening state control over the Internet. Server owners is charged with the obligation to notify Roskomnadzor of the commencement of activities, to store data on all user actions within six months after the end their activities and provide them to law enforcement agencies in cases where provided by law, as well as comply with the requirements for equipment and software and hardware tools to facilitate the operational-search activities. The term "blogger" is legally fixed - in the owner website or page on the Internet, access to which during the day is more than three thousand users not registered as mass media. This definition is unclear in all its parts and its clarification is entrusted to Roskomnadzor. Such a "blogger" is obliged to reveal his real name, is vested with obligations duplicating the provisions of the law "On Mass Media" and be included in a special register. Note that the Chairman of the Council on Rights person under the President of the Russian Federation Mikhail Fedotov addressed to the head of the Federation Council Valentina Matvienko with a letter asking him to reject this bill, the HRC submitted a detailed negative opinion on this draft.

Was approved by the senators and "the bill on the rehabilitation of Nazism" in the version proposed by a group of deputies during headed by Irina Yarova ("United Russia"). Recall Yarovaya proposes to introduce a new article into the Criminal Code and punish with a large fine or deprivation freedom for up to five years for "denying the facts established verdict of the International Military Tribunal for the trial and punishment of the main war criminals of the European Axis countries, approval of crimes, established by the said verdict, as well as the dissemination of deliberately false information about the activities of the USSR during the Second World War, combined with accused of committing the crimes established by the said verdict, committed in public" . From our point of view, in essence, such a law will not bring anything new to the fight against neo-Nazi propaganda, since everything opportunities for such are already provided by Art. 282 of the Criminal Code, but because of the blurry wording can be used to restrict freedom of speech, primarily turn in the historical discussion. Also noteworthy is the legal inaccuracy of the authors of the bill. Attempt by Senator Konstantin Dobrynin oppose this legislative initiative with your own, softer version The bill did not find support in the Federation Council.

Criminal prosecution

In mid-April, the case was transferred to the Moscow City Court Hizb ut-Tahrir follower Timur Malsagov, who is accused according to part 1 of Art. 282.2 of the Criminal Code (organization of the activities of an extremist organization) and Part. 1 st. 30 and Art. 278 of the Criminal Code (attempt to seize power by force). With our point of view, accusing Hizb ut-Tahrir supporters of preparing for seizure of power on the basis of their party activity (holding meetings, distribution of literature, etc.) is unlawful.

At the end of April in Murmansk, the case of the owner and one of the authors of the site "Blogger51" Alexander Serebryanikov, initiated under Part 1 of Art. 282 of the Criminal Code (inciting hatred or hostility, as well as the humiliation of human dignity). Recall, according to ICR, the case was initiated on the fact of the publication of material containing " statements, inciting to hostile actions against a group of persons united by sign of attitude to religion . "The defense claims that we are talking about paragraph of nationalist content in a post about the murder in Moscow of a former head of the representative office of the Murmansk region Adil Nazim oglu Makhmudova. Serebrynikov claims that the paragraph appeared in the text after the site was hacked; detecting interference, the editor promptly deleted someone else's text and moved archived news. From our point of view, in this case there is no no need, obviously, the real reason for this was criticism local authorities by the authors of the site.

At the beginning of the month, the Presidium of the Moscow City Court partially satisfied the supervisory complaint of the participants group Pussy Riot to the verdict passed by them Khamovniki Court. The court changed the legal basis for indictment sentencing: the indication of conviction based on hatred for any social group. Thus, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina, Ekaterina Samutsevich was found guilty of committing hooliganism on the motive religious hatred, by a group of persons by prior agreement. The court commuted the sentence by a month each. Recall we consider the sentence handed down to the members of the group completely unlawful.

In Orel, at the end of the month, the case of recognition as extremist materials posted on the pages of a popular local site "Orlets". Recall that the case was initiated after applying to the FSB for Oryol region from the "Orthodox community", which demanded "check for the presence of a crime under Article 282 of the Criminal Code RF" several materials published on the website. Commissioned UFSB specialists of the Oryol State University philological expertise found " expressions of a hostile and / or derogatory nature towards to persons of a certain confessional group, namely to representatives of the Orthodox faith ." At the same time, docents of OSU proof of the offensive nature of the materials of the site quotes from "The Tale of Bygone Years" and the text of Protodeacon Andrey Kuraev. The examination, carried out at the initiative of the court, was not found in the materials of "Orlets" signs of extremism.

In mid-April, production on criminal case under paragraph "b" h. 1 Article. 213 of the Criminal Code (hooliganism according to hate motive) against the artist Pyotr Pavlensky, which was initiated on the fact of the "Fixation" action, which took place on November 10, 2013 at Red Square. In the decision to terminate the criminal proceedings case, in particular, it is said that since Pavlensky does not have a motive of hatred was, there is no objective side of the crime, the investigation admitted that the artist was guided by the desire to "show in a metaphorical form the socio-political situation in Russia" . Now Pavlensky has the right to rehabilitation and compensation for non-pecuniary damage, caused by unlawful prosecution.

Administrative the pursuit

In April, under Art. 20.29 of the Code of Administrative Offenses for the dissemination of extremist materials was illegally fined 50 thousand Yekaterinburg organization "Rahmat", in the premises of which it was found groundlessly banned in Orenburg book "The Life of the Prophet".

In early April, the Prosecutor's Office of the Chuvash Republic reported that, at the request of the prosecutor's office of Novocheboksarsk, the Moskovsky District Court Novocheboksarsk sentenced the provider LLC "Internet Center" (CHEBNET) under Art. 20.29 of the Code of Administrative Offenses to a fine of 50 thousand rubles, and the Leninsky District Court Cheboksary under the same article fined the director of the city branch of OAO Rostelecom for two thousand rubles for the fact that providers did not provide blocking of materials recognized as extremist by the decision of the Kirovsky District court of Novosibirsk dated June 21, 2013, among which was filmed before elections to the State Duma in 2011, the video of Navalny's supporters "Let's remember To crooks and thieves their Manifesto-2002", which had no signs extremism. In addition, from our point of view, attracting providers to liability under Art. 20.29 of the Code of Administrative Offenses is devoid of grounds, since they are not engaged in deliberate distribution of prohibited materials.

In Maykop he was fined under Art. 20.3 of the Code of Administrative Offenses (propaganda and public demonstration of Nazi paraphernalia or symbols or public display of paraphernalia or symbols of extremist organizations) for two thousand rubles, a deputy of the district council Alexander Petin. A solar symbol was found on the deputy's house "newborn", having a certain resemblance to the swastika, but which was not banned in Russia.

Prohibition of materials for extremism and other state actions

In early April, the Magassky District Court of the Republic of Ingushetia recognized extremist opposition Ingush website habar.org. According to the prosecutor's office, the website posted publications recognized as extremist "for contained in them are public, deliberately false accusations of a person replacing a public position or a public position of a subject of the Russian Federation" , the site editor did not take measures to remove them. We are talking about about two articles banned in 2012; the authors of these texts accuse the head Ingushetia Yevkurov in electoral fraud on December 4, 2011, which follows consider not "knowingly false accusations", but a reason for public trial to establish the truth. From our point of view, these articles were recognized as extremist illegally, respectively, illegally and site ban.

In the middle of the month Lublin The Moscow District Court considered the complaint of Alexei Navalny about the blocking of access to his blog in LiveJournal (navalny.livejournal.com) and recognized it as legal. The blog was blocked for calls for participation in public actions inconsistent with the authorities, which meant following phrase from a blog post dated March 14, 2014: " Now it's not simply "Rally against the war." This procession and rally against lawlessness, which creates the power of crooks and thieves ". At the same time, the court recognized that Roskomnadzor illegally and incorrectly formatted a notice of blocking, including calls for riots and extremist activities. After the announcement the operative part of the decision, the judge indicated that extremism and calls for mass there were no riots on Navalny's blog. Note that in the post referred to speech, Navalny urged readers to come to an agreed march on March 15, dedicated to the situation in Ukraine.

At the end of April it became known that Petrozavodsk The city court canceled the warning about the inadmissibility of violation legislation on countering extremism, which the Prosecutor's Office of the Republic Karelia brought the editor-in-chief of the Karelian newspaper "TVR-Panorama" Evgeny Belyanchikov in March 2014 for published correspondence on recent events in Ukraine and Crimea. Recall, in our opinion, there were no signs of extremism. Its content as a whole boils down to the fact that family members from Ukraine and from Crimea convince a relative worried about their well-being that the situation in their regions is different from the picture painted by the Russian media. Prosecutors in court stated that the publication is not extremist, but is capable of provoking the appearance of comments of an extremist nature, and in addition, Belyanchikov thus, under the guise of reliable information, he disseminated unverified information and rumors. However, the court sided with the editors.

In our review, there is already news about the first unlawful application of Russian anti-extremist legislation in Crimea. At the end of the month, a member of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people, head Charitable Foundation "Crimea" Riza Shevkiev received from acting. prosecutor Republic of Crimea written warning about the inadmissibility of violation law on combating extremist activity. The reason was that on the building of the Mejlis was "posted flag of Ukraine for propaganda and public display, which served excitation of social, national discord and became propaganda exclusivity" . According to the prosecutor's office, "these actions provoked a conflict between the inhabitants of the republic, as a result of which, on 04/21/2014 year, unidentified persons in camouflage removed the national flag Ukraine" . At the same time, "could be harmed to the health of workers of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people" . The prosecutor's office pointed out that "Article 280.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation provides for liability for public calls for the implementation of actions aimed at violating the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation" . From our point of view, flying the flag is definitely reflected the attitude of the members of the Mejlis to the annexation of Crimea to Russia, however it is impossible to interpret these actions as propaganda of exclusivity or discord, just as it is impossible to see in the hanging of the flag and a call for violent separatism, and it is very strange to blame people for the fact that third parties could harm their health.