"Protest Apology": quarantine was used to punish activists

During quarantine, due to the pandemic of coronavirus, the authorities used administrative articles to suppress protest activity-the shares participants were fined for larger amounts. This conclusion was reached by human rights activists of the project "Apology of Protest", their report was published by RBC.

Promotions during pandemia

The lawyer of the project Anna Bochal analyzed reports of the media and social networks about the fines for activists, the data of the "Justice" system and the cases that the lawyers of the "protest apology" were conducted.

She came to the conclusion that the administrative article 20.6.1 introduced in April led to the fact that the protest began to be considered as a threat to the sanitary and epidemiological well-being of the population. Employees of law enforcement agencies who started criminal and administrative cases due to protests in Vladikavkaz and shares of solidarity with residents of Khabarovsk referred to quarantine.

Article 20.6.1 provides for a fine of 1 to 30 thousand rubles. Ordinary citizens were fined along the lower bar, and activists who went to pickets were from 10 to 20 thousand rubles.

Single pickets

Since March 2020, at least 775 pickets, single pickets and picket "queues" have passed across Russia. These are also actions against amendments to the Constitution. In April - May, when the regime of self -isolation operated in many regions, there were many times less protests than in previous or subsequent periods (30 shares in April against 180 in March or 240 in June). According to the OVD-Info, only in the first half of 2020 in Moscow 269 people were detained on single pickets. “This is more than the previous two years combined,” the report said.

Single pickets do not require coordination with the authorities. But the activists often made protocols for violating the self -isolation regime, and in Moscow the protocol was most often added to onrieving the rules for holding a public event at the same time. Compliance with protective measures like wearing a mask and gloves during the action for the police did not matter, they came to the conclusion in the "protest apology".

Wed to Yandex.Zen CR on Instagram SR in Telegram