Original Material
Russia blocks OVD-Info website and demands social media giants to delete it’s accounts. What happens to the major human rights project next?
Roskomnadzor has explained the blocking of the OVD-Info website and social media accounts by justification of terrorism and extremism. What does it mean? What happens now?
On Saturday morning, our website was blocked by the decision of the Lukhovitsky District Court. Later, Roskomnadzor, Russia’s media regulator, demanded from social networks to block our accounts. We have not yet received any official notifications.
We now know the reason why Roskomnadzor demanded to block our website and why they sent social networks a request to block our accounts. It follows from a statement by Roskomnadzor that our website has been added to the registry of websites containing prohibited information, even though it currently cannot be found there. It DOES NOT FOLLOW from the same statement that our project has been declared extremist or terrorist, same as it does not follow from the court case, in which OVD-Info is not a partydefendant. At most, we are looking at recognition of our publications as prohibited materials — which ones, we do not yet know.
We have not yet received any official notifications; Grigory Okhotin, the owner of the website and a co-founder of OVD-Info, has not been informed either about the examination, or the court hearing, or the blocking of the website, even though Okhotin’s lawyer came to the Lukhovitsy’s prosecutor’s office (which filed the lawsuit) on December 14 after being summoned, and attempted to get detailed information about the claims against us.
We view this as a continuation of the attack on civil society by the state. There is nothing surprising in the fact that it is OVD-Info that is now being targeted, as our project is probably the largest human rights project in Russia right now. We cannot say that this attack came as a surprise to us, as we understood that after the attack on the ‘Memorial’ Human Rights Centre and similar claims made against it, we would be the next. However, if in the Memorial case, at least the formal procedure is observed, we were blocked in violation of all possible norms.
In addition, OVD-Info is the main actor of the campaign for the abolition of the legislation on «foreign agents»: after the publication of the relevant petition, we were included in the «foreign agent» list; after the submission of a bill to the State Duma, our website was blocked. This is the way in which the authorities consult with the professional community.
What happens now?
First of all, we will seek to clarify the situation and defend ourselves by the legal means. Naturally, we do not disseminate or condone terrorist or extremist activities. OVD-Info is an independent human rights media project, and we are confident that all the information we publish is credible and does not violate any laws.
Secondly, we will continue our work. Our content is still accessible through social media. Even if all of our accounts are blocked, we will still provide legal help to people who are persecuted for political reasons, and we will find a way to convey necessary and important information to you.
Thirdly, we are still counting on your help. The project has been able to exist for more than 10 years only due to the public support. Not a single court and not a single prosecutor’s office can block the assistance of hundreds of thousands of people. To support us, you can subscribe to our social media accounts and make a small donation, preferably in cryptocurrency.