“The human rights field is being cleared out”: what happened to human rights activists in October

In October, several disturbing news about human rights organizations appeared at once. Many well-known human rights activists were not included in the Public Monitoring Commissions. From the Human Rights Council, the President excluded the active participants. The movement "For Human Rights" was under threat of liquidation. The Civil Rights Committee was searched, and criminal cases were opened against two deputies of its head. OVD-Info tells about the situation.

The new composition of the PMC

Public monitoring commissions monitor the observance of human rights in places of detention. Members of the commissions can visit the institutions of the Federal Penitentiary Service, including colonies and pre-trial detention centers, as well as police departments, guardhouses, and psychiatric hospitals. It is an important body of public control that is able to detect violations, make them public and bring about changes.

In October, the Public Chamber approved new compositions of PMCs in 43 regions. Many human rights activists did not get into the commission.

For example, in St. Petersburg, former members of the commission Yana Teplitskaya and Ekaterina Kosarevskaya did not get into the PMC, thanks to whom it became known about the torture of defendants in the Network case . into the PMC, In the Nizhny Novgorod region, where 20 colonies are located, out of two dozen active human rights activists, only one, the head of the “Committee against Torture”, Igor Kalyapin, got but former security officials got into it. Evgeny Enikeev, a member of the Moscow Helsinki Group, was not included in the Moscow commission. He visited those accused of treason, who are being held in the most closed Lefortovo pre-trial detention center.

“Closed institutions tend to stay that way. Officials would rather take the side of the security forces than support human rights activists. No one needs extra hype around violations and attempts to defend the observance of rights, ”Enikeev believes.

The Moscow commission has 40 observers, and about a quarter of them will be actively working, as in the previous convocation, he says. The situation in the regions is different for the worse, says Ekaterina Kosarevskaya. According to her, in the new convocation of the PMC there are no more than 2-3% of independent observers.

“While in large cities several experienced human rights activists got into commissions, in most regions the lists almost entirely consist of people who are far from public activity, functionaries. There is a feeling that the Public Chamber sought to recruit completely unknown people,” says Kosarevskaya.

She considers the lack of transparency of the election procedure to be the main problem. The Public Chamber may refuse a candidate without explanation. To help newcomers become members of the PMC, human rights activists and activists created the "Shape the PMC 2019" project. Mostly those who were neither in human rights defense nor in activism were able to pass the selection to the commission.

Rotation in HRC

The Human Rights Council also underwent changes in October. President Vladimir Putin appointed a new head - instead of Mikhail Fedotov, the HRC was headed by the former host of Channel One, Secretary of the Public Chamber Valery Fadeev.

Human rights activists Pavel Chikov and Yevgeny Bobrov, political scientist Yekaterina Shulman, and professor at the Higher School of Economics Ilya Shablinsky were expelled from the council. Ex-judge of the Constitutional Court Tamara Morshchakova left the HRC after a change in its composition. “If this is called the Human Rights Council, and some other tasks will be solved, then, as they say, I did not subscribe to this,” said she . Historian and sociologist Svetlana Aivazova asked to be expelled due to staff rotation and health reasons.

In her YouTube blog, Shulman suggested that the remaining members of the council would also leave over time. “I would not say that all human rights protection has been covered with a copper basin yet. Now that it’s all over, frankly, we didn’t have any authority,” said . she

Suspended HRC members prepared reports on electoral irregularities and subsequent protests. After the action on July 27, the Investigative Committee opened a criminal case on "mass riots" , in which 15 people were initially accused. Later, the persecution against five people was stopped, and most of those arrested were charged with other articles. Arrests in this case are still ongoing.

“Our main idea was that there were no riots. And Article 212 [of the Criminal Code on riots] too,” Shulman noted. the reason for his exclusion from the council Shablinsky considered the conclusion of the election commission that the refusal to register 29 candidates for deputies of the Moscow City Duma was unlawful.

“The HRC, despite the loss of its former glory, remained Baba Yaga, who is almost always against it. And since there is no less reason to be against, he continued to annoy. And the authorities in the country endure less and less irritation, they want comfort, an easy chair and pleasant words. I don’t want unpleasant ones,” wrote . Chikov

Liquidation of the "foreign agent"

The Movement for Human Rights unites human rights organizations across the country, has branches in 40 regions and provides assistance in cases of violation of a wide range of rights - from the rights of entrepreneurs to prisoners.

Over the past two months, Lev Ponomarev, head of the HRA, has been fined five times under the “foreign agents” law. And the total amount of fines for the movement itself reached almost two million.

“In fact, a new technology was tested on us - they began to fine us for any links to the HRA, including in social networks. Later, Memorial, Public Verdict and other ‘foreign agents’ received the same fines,” the human rights activist notes.

Since February, ZHR has been listed in the register of "foreign agents", in October the Ministry of Justice demanded that the Supreme Court liquidate the movement.

The Ministry of Justice substantiated its claim by the fact that the organization repeatedly violated the law. In addition to fines, among the violations is the discrepancy between the charter of the movement and the amendments to the Civil Code. At the same time, the charter was adopted in 2014, while the amendments appeared later.

Ponomarev considers the claims far-fetched. According to him, some of the fines have already been paid, while others have not yet entered into force. The shortcomings of the charter were discovered by the Ministry of Justice only four years after its adoption. Employees of the movement suggested that the ministry wait for the congress of members of the organization, at which they planned to amend the charter, but the letter remained unanswered.

“It is obvious to me that the HRA has simply become inconvenient for the authorities. All claims against us are purely bureaucratic. The very recognition of us as “foreign agents” is a rather interesting story. We received a grant from the UN Committee on Torture, which actually includes Russia. That is, it is impossible to name the state in whose interests we act, as it were. But they decided to cling to it,” the human rights activist explains.

For eight years, the main source of funds for the HRA was presidential grants, but this year the movement was denied funding. Fines followed, and as a result, a lawsuit for liquidation. According to Ponomarev, the reason for such pressure is that For Human Rights worked on many high-profile cases that the FSB is conducting. Among them are the Network and New Greatness cases, criminal trials against followers of Jehovah's Witnesses and members of Hizb ut-Tahrir.

“I am sure that the human rights field is now purposefully cleared. It cannot be said that everything was fine before, and then once it started. This is a gradual process, it has been going on for a long time. Mass protests could be the catalyst. Perhaps if they weren’t there, the pressure would be slower and softer,” says Ponomarev.

He believes that the movement has almost no chance of avoiding liquidation. The HRA intends to continue its work regardless of the decision of the court.

Two criminal cases and a search of the Civil Rights Committee

Andrei Mayakov, deputy chairman of the Committee for Civil Rights, was arrested on charges of attempted fraud. He was detained after a search in the office of the organization. On October 22, “a guy with a package broke into the office” and announced that he was going to transfer the money to Mayakov, said Yulia Perepelova, member of the board of the committee.

Next, employees of NTV and REN TV entered the room, later the security forces appeared. A few days later, NTV aired a film in which both the Civil Rights Committee and the Human Rights Movement were accused of fraud. Other human rights organizations are also mentioned as "organizers of riots". Footage of Mayakov's detention appears at the very beginning of the video.

The investigation believes that Mayakov received "illegal remuneration" from the prisoner for the promise to get the prosecutor's office to review the sentence. The human rights activist allegedly demanded 2.5 million rubles, but during the first payment he was detained.

According to the head of the Committee for Civil Rights, Andrei Babushkin, the man himself invited Mayakov to meet, and then persuaded him to take a package that contained a dummy of money.

“He wanted to give Andrei Mayakov a package in which there was an envelope with money. Andrei said that it was necessary to draw up a donation agreement with the commandant. The man insisted at first, but eventually went to the commandant and left the package there. After that, employees of the FSB, the Investigative Committee, the criminal investigation department and NTV came in, ”says Perepelova.

Babushkin calls the incident a provocation. “Under house arrest, my deputy Alexander Makhaev, in custody - the second. The offenses imputed to him are far-fetched, and the information in the media appeared before the lawyers received it. This suggests the idea of ​​the ordered nature of the cases, ”he says.

Alexander Makhaev is suspected of contributing to a major theft from Mayakov's apartment. The reason allegedly was a personal conflict between colleagues and a desire for revenge. At the same time, according to Babushkin, Mayakov himself, who is involved in this case as a victim, has no claims against Makhaev.