Why Amnesty International has deprived Alexei Navalny's status of a prisoner of conscience

The international human rights organization Amnesty International (AI) denied politics to Alexei Navalny in the status of a prisoner of conscience. The reason for the decision was the videos of a policy of fifteen years ago, in which the organization’s experts found rhetoric of hatred. At the same time, Navalny had already received this status more than once. The correspondent of "New" figured out how strong it was to reputs the politician and how the Russia Today television channel was involved in this story.

Amnesty International recognized the politician as a prisoner of conscience on January 17 after his detention at Moscow airport. According to the organization’s website, a prisoner of conscience is anyone who is deprived of freedom on the basis of his political, religious or other beliefs, as well as due to belonging to a certain race, nationality, sexual orientation, etc. “Alexei Navalny was deprived of freedom for his peaceful political activity and the realization of his right to freedom of expression,” the organization said. In this regard, AI called on “immediate and unconditional” to release him to freedom.

Politics has already been given the status of a prisoner of conscience in 2012 and 2018. This time in this status, Navalny stayed only a month and a half. The refusal of Amnesty International to consider a politician prisoner of conscience became known on Tuesday. This was the first to report the American journalist Aaron Mate on his Twitter. The screenshot of the letter of the organization, which was attached to tweet, said that Amnesty International made such a decision due to the fact that before the politician could advocate violence and discrimination and then did not abandon his statements.

The information was later confirmed by the AI ​​manager for Eastern Europe and Central Asia, Alexander Artemyev. In a conversation with the Mediazona, he added that we are talking about the statements of Navalny's mid -zero years. As the legal and political department of the organization, some statements by Navalny of that time reach the level of Hate Spech ( literally - “rhetoric of hatred.” - Ed. ). In turn, according to the rules of a human rights organization, the status of a prisoner of conscience implies that the political prisoner did not resort to violence, and also did not call him others and did not arouse hatred. According to the director of the Russian representative office of the organization Natalia Zvyagina, human rights activists have only now drew attention to these videos, since the Amnesty International received the appeals of people demanding to reconsider the status of Navalny.

In February, Amnesty International handed over to the Kremlin a petition demanding to free Navalny, which was signed by 200 thousand people from different countries. Despite the refusal of a special status, the organization is not going to terminate the campaign in support of the politician.

As Novaya Gazeta told in Amnesty International, nothing of what was said by Navalny in the past justifies his current conclusion, which is purely political in nature.

In turn, the term “prisoner of conscience” is a characteristic based on a number of internal criteria established by the organization. There are no differences in relation to political prisoners with this status and without it.

- The speculation around the use of Amnesty International The term “Prisoner of Conscience” distracts attention from our basic requirement of the immediate release of Alexei Navalny. This distraction plays into the hands of only the Russian authorities, who deprived Naval Freedom for political reasons for daring to criticize them, ”explained Julie Verkhar, acting as the General Secretary General of Amnesty International.

As the organization is added, Amnesty International advocates the release of people who are unfairly deprived of liberty, and will continue to do this with respect to Alexei Navalny. The conclusion of Navalny for his peaceful opposition and exposure of corruption is illegal, and we will continue the continuous campaign for his liberation and his right to freedom of expression.

Was there a planned campaign?

Alexei Navalny was not the first to be deprived of the status of a prisoner of conscience. In the 60s, the fate of the Russian opposition was divided by the former president of South Africa and the leader of the Apartheid Moveon Mandela. Despite the fact that in 1962, AI recognized Mandel as a prisoner of conscience after he was convicted of armed struggle, the organization refused Mandel in this status. In addition, Amnesty International twice refused to consider prisoners of the conscience of the ex-owner of Yukos Mikhail Khodorkovsky and former head of Menatep Bank Platon Lebedev.

The deprivation of Alexei Navalny status caused a wide resonance, he was condemned by both supporters of Navalny and other public figures. The press secretary of the politician Kira Yarmysh noted on Twitter that the policy was deprived of status at the request of the propagandists.

Journalist Michael Naki pointed out that now the propagandists “will be savory” that Amnesty excluded Navalny of the prisoners of conscience, forgetting to mention that the organization still demands to free him.

On Wednesday, the FBK lawyer (the Russian authorities consider the organization to be “ino -agent”) Alexander Golovach abandoned the status of a prisoner of conscience, which in 2018 appropriated him by Amnesty International after he was detained by the police on charges of violating the rallies' law.

“I declare that I refuse this status now and in the future, since it can be deprived of the pressure of the Putin State Propaganda,” Golovach wrote on his Twitter.

The possible campaign to discredit Alexei Navalny was told by the journalists of the Mediazones and The Insider. The representative of Amnesty said in an interview with The Insider that the organization received many identical requests to verify Navalny's words. Some authors referred to the same video of 2007.

- We received many requests. They began to act almost simultaneously and looked very similar in content. In this sense, we see coordination and admit that perhaps they could be made on the basis of not goodwill, but maliciously, ”said Artemyev.

Mediazona, citing anonymous sources, said that

The campaign to discredit Alexei Navalny in other countries can be “people with RT in different countries”.

Aaron Mate, who informed the news, is also a frequent guest RT. In addition, Mate works in The Grayzone, which was founded by the American journalist Max Blumental, who regularly writes for Sputnik and RT. The Mediazone also noted that the authors at least two appeals in Amnesty International referred to the thread on the Twitter of Katya Kazbek, who exposed Navalny to a foreign audience as a “nationalist and racist”. This information was subsequently confirmed by the director of the Russian representative office of the organization Natalya Zvyagin. The New Gazeta sent questions about the role of a TV channel in Russia Today in the history of deprivation of the deprivation of the premium of a prisoner of conscience, but by the time of writing the material in RT they did not answer them.

Katya Kazbek (Dubovitskaya) now lives in the USA and periodically cooperates with RT. For example, Kazbek wrote about protests in Belarus, in which she called the protesters “useful idiots”, which are used in the “color revolution”.

The girl positions herself as a socialist and a Quir-activist, while she is a supporter of the activities of Joseph Stalin.

Father Kazbek is a businessman Yuri Dubovitsky, who in 1991 founded a network of computer stores "White Wind". In the zero company father, Kazbek was estimated in the amount of up to $ 100 million. In 2015, the White Wind went bankrupt, but by that time Dubovitsky had already sold most of his share in the company.

On January 19, the day after the arrest of Navalny, Kazbek published a thread on Twitter, in which she called the politics a “nationalist and racist”. She reinforced her words with links to the old videos of the head of the FBK, as well as his tweets and interviews.

“Imagine it in another country, and you will get a vile picture.” If Navalny lived in the USA, he would be against immigrants from Mexico and Guatemala. If he lived in France, he would have ranted against the Algerians and Congolens, - Kazbek wrote.

After the deprivation of the quarter status of a prisoner of conscience, the editor -in -chief of RT and MIA Russia Today, Margarita Simonyan, wrote that the organization did this "after our Columnist (we are talking about Katya Kazbek. - Ed.) With specific examples that he was Nazik." After that, Twitte in the Relatist Relorica came to Kazbek herself and accused Simonyan of racism. Subsequently, the girl said that she cooperates with RT, because on the TV channel she is given a platform to promote her agenda.

- Why did I write for Radio Liberty, founded by the Nazis and the CIA? Why did I write for the "left American magazine> Jacobin, who hit the" former president of Bolivia "Evo Morales with a knife in the back? Why did I write for the Kazakh magazine, although I have never been to Kazakhstan? Any platform that I can control will be given to me to promote the communist agenda, ” said Kazbek on Twitter.

In the 2000s, Navalny really participated in the nationalist "Russian marches" and called for the regulation of the flow of migrants. In 2007, Navalny, together with the writer Zakhar Prilepin and politician Sergei Gulyaev, founded the National Democratic Movement “The People”, which produced provocative videos (one of them recalls Kazbek). At the same time, Navalny was excluded from the Yabloko party with the wording “for causing political damage to the party, in particular, for nationalist activities. Later, the politician moved away from organizing the right, and subsequently apologized for many of his words.

As noted in Amnesty International, the organization drew attention to the fact that some of the past comments by Alexei Navalny were actively used by his opponents to discredit it. In addition, the organizations noted that Amnesty International itself was the object of the slanderous campaigns of the Russian authorities as a result of their consistent convictions of violations of the Kremlin of human rights.

The New Gazeta sent questions about the role of the TV channel in the history of the Amnesty International to Russia Today. Later, the text of the message was published by the editor-in-chief of Russia Today Margarita Simonyan in his telegram channel. Simonyan wrote as an answer, “when it seems to be baptized. And also when the impression is “impressed” ”[ the words of Artemyev, said by The Insider - ed. ].

On Thursday, the journalist of The Moscow Times, Peter Sauer, published on his twitter a recording of a zoom conference with the leadership of Amnesty International. The recording of the call was made by the prankers Vovan and Lexus ( the video is on the YouTube channel ). They claim that they contacted the leadership of AI under the guise of the head of the regional headquarters of Alexei Navalny Leonid Volkov. According to the record, the general secretary of the organization Julie Verkhar, as well as the director and deputy director for Europe and Central Asia, Marie Strazers and Denis Krivosheev participated in the conversation.

The prankers asked what should be done so that Navalny was returned back to the status of a prisoner of conscience. In the video of the deputy director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia, Denis Krivosheev answered them that the return of the status "will not bring anything good to anyone." The organization cannot change its terminology so that Navalny is suitable for the definition of Amnesty. According to Krivosheev,

This conflict will help solve only the speedy liberation of Alexei Navalny from prison.

- We understand what happened has brought a lot of damage, including us. Now in Russia there is no more important task, [than the liberation of Navalny]. We would like to get around the attention of the media from our internal solutions. Let's save the message “Free Navalny,” Krivosheev said.

What can I do?

Immediately free Alexei Navalny! The petition of Novaya Gazeta was signed with this requirement by more than 200 thousand people