Translated material
Pursuit of political prisoners: Appeal to the Committee of Ministers of CE
An appeal on the implementation of general measures in accordance with the rule of 9.2 for the group of cases “Navalny and officers against Russia” submitted by non-governmental organizations “Human Rights School of Memorial”, the ATS-Info and an independent human rights project “In support of the political prisoners. Memorial"
January 30, 2025
Introduction
The material was prepared by the NGO “Center for the Protection of Human Rights“ Memorial ”, an independent human rights project“ Support for political prisoners. Memorial "and the OVD-Info.
The Human Rights Protection Center “Memorial” is a non -governmental organization founded in June 2022 by participants in the Memorial human rights center (liquidated on December 29, 2021) to continue work. The Memorial human rights center was founded in 1993 in Moscow and became one of the first human rights NGOs in modern Russia. He worked with gross violations of human rights in (post) conflict zones, civil and political rights and vulnerable groups. He represented the interests of hundreds of victims both at the national level and in the European Court of Human Rights (hereinafter - the ECHR or the Court). The Center for Human Rights Protection "Memorial" continues to provide legal assistance to victims of violations of human rights, conduct a lawyer and strategic trials.
Independent human rights project “Support for political prisoners. The memorial ” until April 5, 2022 acted as part of PC Memorial as a program“ Support for persons affected by political reasons and other victims of politically motivated repressions ”. After the liquidation of the Memorial PCC, the program began work as an independent human rights project “Support for political prisoners. Memorial ”, which is engaged in the collection, study and systematization of information about illegal criminal prosecutions for political reasons, and also helps the victims of such persecution.
ATS-Info is an independent human rights project aimed at monitoring political persecution in Russia and providing legal assistance to the victims of such persecution. OVD-INFO was created during mass protests in December 2011 as a volunteer project to publish information about protesters. Today, OTD-Info is a 24-hour federal hotline for collecting information about all types of political persecution and coordination of legal assistance to their victims. Also, ATS-Info is engaged in the legal education of activists, explores various types of political persecution in Russia, conducts campaigns to protect rights and strategic lawsuits.
In this appeal, we will consider the escalation of political persecution in Russia. The appeal reflects the trend of criminalization of dissent, including anti -war statements, to suppress the opposition and ensure ideological conformism, as well as inadequate conditions of detention and lack of medical care for political prisoners.
The main conclusions of the ECHR
Cases concern a series of incidents with the participation of Alexei Navalny, a political activist, the leader of the opposition and a fighter with corruption, who became the target of the Russian authorities. These incidents demonstrated the presence of a consistent political persecution system aimed at suppressing the opposition and his critical statements.
The first two cases concern criminal proceedings in 2013 and 2014, as a result of which Navalny and other applicants were convicted of actions similar to standard commercial activities. The court established the unreasonableness of court decisions: the defendants did not ensure guarantees of a fair trial and criminal law was interpreted arbitrarily. Four other cases concern the repeated detention and arrest of Alexei Navalny during rallies from 2012 to 2017, it concerns his house arrest, one - the introduction of a prohibition of travel. The last thing concerns the sudden deterioration of Navalny’s health during a flight from Tomsk to Moscow in 2020, which required an emergency landing and medical intervention, and then transported to Germany for treatment. The authorities did not investigate the incident in which a substance was used, identified as prohibited chemical weapons in accordance with international and national legislation.
The ECHR established numerous violations of the European Convention on Human Rights (hereinafter - the Convention). Including the court found that house arrest, as well as repeated arrests and detention of Navalny served as a hidden goal of suppressing political pluralism and undermining democracy based on the rule of law (violation of Article 18 in conjunction with Articles 5 and 11).
In previous decisions on the supervision of the execution of the decisions of these applicants, the Committee of Ministers emphasized the pattern of arbitrary abuse of criminal and administrative legislation and urged Russia to comply with its international legal obligations and ensure the independence of the judicial system. The committee insisted on urgent liberation of all political prisoners taking into account the risk for their health and consequences for freedom of expression of opinions and political pluralism. The Committee also called on the Russian authorities to allow independent international bodies to monitor the state of health and the conditions for the maintenance of political prisoners in anticipation of their release or revising their affairs.
Current status of solutions
Since the last consideration of the case in March 2024, the situation has not improved. The Russian authorities continue the practice of politically motivated criminal prosecution of dissenters.
According to the independent human rights project “Support for political prisoners. Memorial ”, as of January 2025, the number of political prisoners (according to the definition of the 2012 PACE resolution ), according to a conservative assessment, is 820 people. This number is constantly growing. According to the ATS-INFO , 1465 people were subjected to politically motivated persecution and are currently in custody.
A significant part of the political prisoners are persons pursued for an anti -war position or support of Ukraine in its protection against aggression. At least 132 people were deprived of freedom under articles 207.3 (public distribution of knowingly false information on the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation) and 280.3 (public actions aimed at discrediting the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation) of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (hereinafter - the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), introduced immediately after the start of a full -scale invasion in 2022.
Criminal prosecution and imprisonment in connection with accusations on these articles are absolutely arbitrary. A typical example of such an arbitrary and clearly politically motivated (at the direct instructions of the chairman of the Investigative Committee of Russia A. Bastrykin) of the application of Article 207.3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation-the sentence of the 68-year-old pediatrician Nadezhda Buyanova. The verdict was sentenced for the alleged phrase of the widow of the Russian soldier who was killed in Ukraine that he was a legal goal for the Ukrainian armed forces. In addition to the fact that the fact of the statement is not proven, it clearly does not contain false information, but only based on well -known norms of international humanitarian law approval. Nevertheless, Buyanova sentenced - 5 years and 6 months in prison.
Article 205.2 (public calls for the commission of terrorist activities, the public justification of terrorism or the propaganda of terrorism) of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation has recently become the main instrument of criminal prosecution for anti -war, pro -Ukrainian and opposition statements. The persecution under this article includes, in particular, any statements mentioning without unambiguous condemnation of the organization, associations and events arbitrarily recognized by the Russian authorities “terrorist”. Thus, the famous scientist and public figure Boris Karelitsky was sentenced to 5 years in prison for the statement that the attack of the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the Crimean bridge was predictable and expected.
A lot of direct actions against administrative objects (military commissariats, etc.), such as arson that did not cause significant damage, are arbitrarily qualified not as damage to property, but as an act of terrorism.
Dozens of Russian citizens were sentenced to long prison deadlines for accusations of state treason for a real or alleged intention to join the units of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, which exercise legitimate protection of Ukraine from Russian aggression, or simply for small monetary donations in favor of Ukraine.
The innovation of last year was criminal prosecution and imprisonment of accusations related to the participation of the so -called “International Movement of LGBT” in the activities of the recognized extremist organization in 2023.
In addition, the Russian authorities continue to pursue and put people for belonging to Jehovah's Witnesses and the organization of their activities. Currently, at least 160 people are detained by court order or as part of a preliminary investigation.
The conditions of detention in the conclusion remain unsatisfactory, the prisoners are subjected to torture and humiliating the dignity of a person with treatment. Political prisoners are often arbitrarily and unreasonably placed in penalties, single cameras or institutions with an enhanced security regime.
At the same time, in places of imprisonment, the persecuted by the state is subjected not only to the violence authorized by the state. OVD-Info documented 107 cases of additional pressure on accused of politically motivated criminal cases, including physical or psychological violence, refusal to medical care or deliberately poor conditions of detention. 49 of these cases, pressure are associated with the conditions of content in colonies and investigative insulators, and 36 out of 49 cases include physical violence and torture.
In January 2025, the ATS-Info reported about 7 politically persecuted people placed in a schizo. The punishments were argued, among other things , the “improper performance of the morning charging” , “prayer commission” and other unknown reasons.
According to the ATS-INFO, as of January 15, 2025, at least 166 arrested in politically motivated affairs suffer from health problems. Most of them do not receive proper medical care in prison. A striking example is the former municipal deputy Alexei Gorinov , suffering from chronic lung disease and chronic bronchitis, as well as undergoing partial removal of the lung in 2016. Instead of obtaining the necessary treatment, he faced with improper treatment, including turning off heating in the cell in December 2024. The case of Amet Suleimanov is similar. Suleimanov was sentenced to 12 years in prison for the alleged participation in Hizb Ut-Tahrir. He suffers from severe heart pathologies requiring urgent operation, as well as from hypertension and threatening blindness of retinal angiopathy, but remains in conclusion without proper care.
The lack of medical care is a serious threat to the life of those who are in conclusion on politically motivated matters. In 2024, eight people who underwent political persecution died in prison or shortly after release due to insufficient medical care, due to the consequences of a dry hunger strike or torture that representatives of the state subjected them.
Recommendations
We ask the Committee of Ministers to admit that the Russian authorities have not fulfilled general measures for these cases, and to indicate the following measures to the Russian authorities for execution:
- cancel or change all laws that limit the freedom of expression of opinions, freedom of assembly and associations. In particular, to cancel the laws on fakes on the army, discrediting the army and discriminatory laws against LGBT people; change anti -terrorism legislation, excluding the possibility of excessively wide interpretation;
- ensure that the legislation is not unlawfully applied for political persecution. For example, to exclude criminal prosecution for ordinary commercial activities;
- to stop the practice of political persecution, including for counteracting the invasion of Ukraine and other forms of dissent;
- to stop the practice of discrimination of religious, sexual and other minorities;
- to release all prisoners who have undergone political persecution, to bring public apologies and provide compensation to all victims;
- investigate all cases of politically motivated persecution and bring to the guilty to justice;
- to revise in national courts all the cases in which the ECHR established violations of articles 5, 6 and 18 of the Convention, and make new decisions in accordance with the practice of the ECHR;
- improve the conditions of detention in accordance with international standards in the field of human rights and provide prisoners with access to proper medical care;
- investigate all cases of physical or psychological violence in places of imprisonment, as well as cases of refusal to medical care or creating deliberately poor conditions of detention; Remember the perpetrators.