Translated material
Not only Crimea and Maidan
This report is dedicated to political persecution in Russia in 2015 and 2016.
In 2015 and 2016, the Memorial’s human rights center recognized as political prisoners pursued for political reasons and in connection with the exercise of the right to freedom of religion of more than a hundred people. Judging by the database of political persecution, which is conducted by the ATS-Info, based on the data of a number of human rights organizations, in 2015–2016, criminal cases of a political orientation were instituted against at least 251 people.
In 2015-2016, political education was facilitated by the “postcrymist syndrome”: after Ukrainian events that had a great resonance in Russia, as well as after the accession of Crimea, most of the opposition groups lost activity, including thanks to the actions of the authorities.
In the indicated period, new repressive laws were adopted, punishment was tightened by a number of administrative and criminal articles, and the attacks on activists and human rights activists were commonplace. But the greatest resonance had numerous political criminal cases - their review is the main part of the report.
In ordinaryness was imprisonment for posts and reposts in social networks. As it turned out, in this way it is possible to plant, for example, for other people's comments on reposts or a photograph of a banner at a rally agreed with the Moscow police. The reason for the establishment of a criminal case in the described period has become repeated exits to peaceful street actions, including single pickets.
The report consists of two intersecting sections. One of them is devoted to the actual trends, the second - to people whose persecution is an example of these trends. Each section can be read in a row. Each head in the section is associated with the corresponding head in another section, that is, from the head of the head about a certain tendency, you can go to the head of the person about a person whose persecution illustrates this trend, and vice versa.