An update on the situation human rights defenders in Russia is unfortunately needed too frequently. Recently the Martin Ennals Foundation condemned the attacks on its 2013 Laureate, the Joint Mobile Group (JMG) which is known for its courageous work in opening legal cases on behalf of victims of torture in Chechnya. On March 9th, they were travelling together with journalists and the group was physically attacked, their confidential notes stolen, and the vehicles they were in burned. Their offices in Ingushetia were also attacked. The international and local media have reported (see list at bottom of the post). This is part of an ongoing pattern of threats and intimidation directed against JMG.
Now, Human Rights Watch and others report that yesterday (16 March) Igor Kalyapin, head of the Committee for the Prevention of Torture, one of the founders and participants of the Joint Mobile Group, was attacked as he was leaving his hotel in Grozny. They also pelted him with eggs, and threw flour and bright antiseptic liquid on him, which stained his face and clothes. “The attack on Igor Kalyapin shows again that it’s open season on human rights defenders in Chechnya,” said Hugh Williamson, of Human Rights Watch. “The authorities’ utter failure to hold anyone to account for a series of vicious attacks in recent years is like a bright green light for further attacks.”
[The March 16 attack was the fourth in the last 15 months on Joint Mobile Group staff and offices in the North Caucasus. In addition to the March 9 attack, on June 3, 2015, unidentified people in masks forced their way into the organization’s office in Grozny, destroying the contents of the office and forcing its staff out. On December 13, 2014, unidentified attackers set fire to the office. The next day, Chechen police without a warrant ransacked the office and took mobile phones, several cameras, laptop computers, and other electronic equipment. They also conducted body searches of the two Joint Mobile Group employees who worked there and searched their car. No one has been held accountable for these attacks.]
President Vladimir Putin’s press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, may well have called the 9 March 2016 attack “absolutely outrageous” and may stated that the Kremlin was counting on local law enforcement to “take the most effective measures to find the perpetrators, in order to ensure the safety of human rights defenders and journalists”, but in reality this is more like a cover up than a call for effective investigations.
The actions taken against human rights defenders and their NGOs (such as through the foreign agent law – see also previous posts: https://thoolen.wordpress.com/tag/russia/) are clear evidence as well as the recent closing of the United Nations’ human rights office in Moscow. A report on March 12 by Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency said the Russian diplomatic mission in Geneva confirmed that a decision was made to close the mission in Moscow. Russian ambassador Aleksei Borodavkin was quoted by RIA Novosti as saying the UN has helped to create human rights institutions in Russia and “we do not see anything extraordinary” about the Moscow office being closed. (via: http://www.rferl.org/content/un-ohchr-moscow-office-closure-russia/27607266.html
That closing things is what the Government prefers is also clear from a 11 February 2016 report by the The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders (a joint programme of FIDH and OMCT) which tells how the first human rights organization is liquidated by a court for “influencing public opinion”.
In a lawsuit filed by the Ministry of Justice, the NGO “Agora” was charged with violating the infamous law on “foreign agents”. It is noteworthy that the verdict violates the Constitution of the Russian Federation, which allows for liquidation in limited cases only, namely, if an organisation carries out activities aimed at undermining the constitutional order, threatening national security or putting citizens’ lives and health in danger. In its lawsuit, the Ministry has not accused “Agora” of any of the above-mentioned activities.[According to the lawyer representing the organisation, the Ministry accused “Agora” of “influencing public opinion”, of being a “foreign agent”, and of undertaking efforts to be excluded from the registry of “foreign agents”. It has now six months to close down. The organisation intends to appeal the decision before the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation.]
Marking yet another step in the ongoing repression launched by the Russian State against human rights defenders, the decision came on the day the Chairman of the Council on Human Rights under the Presidential Administration submitted a proposal to clarify the term “political activity” in the law on “foreign agents”. The proposal suggests to define “political activity” exclusively as “a struggle for political power” and thus repels the existing vague wording allowing to qualify any civil society organisation activity as political.
After endless persecutions and harassment that made the functioning of civil society organisations impossible, it is the first time that the Ministry of Justice has demanded the liquidation of a human rights organisation for “influencing public opinion”. The day after the decision, on February 11, 2016, the election monitoring association “Golos” received a letter informing them of a lawsuit filed by the Ministry of Justice demanding the closing down of the association. Shortly before, on January 28, 2016, the department of the Ministry of Justice in the Orenburg region brought administrative charges against the Committee for Prevention of Torture (CPT) and its Chairman Mr. Igor Kalyapin, in relation to alleged violations of the “foreign agents” law.
“Agora, a courageous and notorious watchdog of Russian citizens’ rights, was already inspected by the Prosecutor’s office, the Ministry of Interior, the Tax inspection, and after months of various judicial procedures, the court finally closed them down once and for all, clearly stating the main reason for this decision was their human rights activities“,declared Karim Lahidji, FIDH President. “Human rights are rightly enshrined in the Russian Constitution, yet seeking their implementation is perceived as political activity. A State that cares about its constitution would invest its energy in preventing constitutional rights violations as opposed to preventing human rights work“,OMCT Secretary General Gerald Staberock added.
Those who follow NGOs reports like those of Front Line (https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/en) will recall just this year the cases of:
- On 1 March 2016, human rights defender Ms Elena Shakhova was questioned by representatives of the local office of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) in Saint Petersburg over the work of the non-governmental organisation Citizens Watch. Her fellow human rights defender Ms Maria Razumovskaya has been summoned to report to the FSB office for questioning over the same subject on 9 March 2016.
- On 18 February 2016, five people, including a representative of the Department of Municipal Property of Moscow city, replaced the lock on the entrance door to the office of the Adaptation and Education Centre for Refugee Children, without presenting an official eviction order, and installed an alarm system inside of the office, thereby preventing employees of the Centre from accessing the premises. Currently headed by the human rights defender Ms Olga Nikolaenko, the Centre was established in 1996 with the aim of helping refugee children to adapt to their new life in Russia. The Civic Assistance Committee works on a broader range of issues, providing legal and humanitarian assistance to refugees in Russia. On 20 April 2015, the Committee was enlisted as a ‘foreign agent’ by decision of the Ministry of Justice of Russia.
Sources:
https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/03/17/russia-rights-defender-attacked-chechnya
Sources for 9 March 2016 attack:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-35769634
Russia Today: https://www.rt.com/news/335063-human-rights-journos-attacked-ingushetia/
Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards 
March 28, 2016 at 13:37
[…] in particular, has been demonstrated time and again in the social media including this blog (https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2016/03/17/russia-defenders-attack-closing-office-un-joint-mobile-grou…). In the film “Chechnya, War Without Trace” award-winning journalist Manon Loizeau, […]
October 29, 2016 at 10:23
[…] council seat from others in the UN; rather than its treatment of human rights defenders back home. https://thoolen.wordpress.com/2016/03/17/russia-defenders-attack-closing-office-un-joint-mobile-grou…] It is rare for one of the five permanent UN Security Council member nations to lose an election […]
January 15, 2018 at 19:31
[…] especially since two of the laureates of the MEA were linked to work there (the Joint Mobile Group (https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2016/03/17/russia-defenders-attack-closing-office-un-joint-mobile-…😉 in 2013 and earlier Lyda Yusopova in 2004 http://www.martinennalsaward.org/hrd/lidia-yusupova/]. […]
July 15, 2019 at 11:45
[…] Activists of the Joint Mobile Group of human rights defenders in Chechnya, which played a crucial role in providing legal aid to victims of abuses by local security officials in the years after Estemirova’s murder, were subjected to numerous attacks in 2014-2016. On March 9, 2016, two members of the group and six foreign and Russian journalists traveling to Chechnya were attacked by apparent proxies of Chechen authorities in Ingushetia, near the administrative border with Chechnya. Mobsters, apparently acting on the orders of Chechen authorities, attacked and destroyed the group’s office twice. All of these attacks have been carried out with complete impunity, forcing the group to withdraw from Chechnya due to security concerns. [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2016/03/17/russia-defenders-attack-closing-office-un-joi…%5D […]