Foreign agent “Memorial” was liquidated in Russia
The Supreme Court of the Russian Federation liquidated the foreign agent organization Memorial today. The reason was repeated, gross violations of Russian laws and other legal acts.
A representative of the General Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation, Alexei Zhafyarov, stated in court that Memorial distorts the memory of the Great Patriotic War and creates a false image of the USSR.
“International Memorial was created as an organization to perpetuate memory, but now it is almost entirely focused on distorting historical memory. We are forced to observe attempts to rehabilitate Nazi criminals. This is because someone is paying for it - and this is the real reason why Memorial fights so carefully against openly calling itself a foreign agent,” Zhafyarov said.
He recalled that since 1991, the Prosecutor General’s Office alone has rehabilitated 500 thousand people, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs - 3 million, the work continues.
“Memorial has never turned to them for the rehabilitation of convicts,” the prosecutor noted.
Memorial's lawyers, in turn, asked not to apply such a strict measure of liability as liquidation, noting that they had already received and paid fines for violations.
“Today’s case is the first case where the basis for the liquidation of an organization is a violation of the law on foreign agents. This is the only reason stated. Most of the attacks that we heard today in the debate are not related to the lawsuit. All accusations of falsifying history and political activities are not relevant to today’s case. Memorial International does not agree with the legislation on foreign agents, but implements it in good faith,” said lawyer Grigory Vaypan.
And the fashionable Moscow lawyer Henry Reznik burst out with political accusations.
“I believe that this appeal by the Prosecutor General’s Office to the court fully falls within the formulation of a bad-faith statement of a baseless claim. When I come across this kind of claims by representatives of the authorities, denounced with great powers, when they come from influential bodies included in the system of state power, I will not hide, I feel disgusting. Professionalism requires you to drive away this feeling and work. But the feeling of nastiness is constantly fueled when I turn to the text of the statement of claim. It, the feeling, is based on the fact that this kind of political cases, alas, end in non-just decisions,” Reznik said.
The Supreme Court's decision caused groans and grumbling among liberals.
“This is monstrous. I went to the Supreme Court several times. I support the Memorial Society. I believe that this is the last barrier that we probably already have to say “was”, unfortunately, on the way to the complete Stalinization of society and the state. This means there will be Stalinization. It will be reflected in politics too. And what we have now is still Stalinism light. I'm afraid it will be much worse. This is a tragedy for our country,” said one of the leaders of the Yabloko party, Sergei Mitrokhin, on the Ekho Moskvy radio station.
He is echoed by the Moscow liberal-Navalnist Ilya Yashin.
“The heirs of the executioners do not want to be reminded of who their ancestors were and who they themselves are,” Yashin said.
The liberals began to suffer in advance; the flash mob has been going on for months. Additional worries for the “progressive public” were caused by yesterday’s decision of the Karelian court, which sentenced the head of the local Memorial organization, Yuri Dmitriev, to 15 years in prison for pedophilia. Previously, under pressure from liberals, he was given only 3,5 years for indecent acts against an underage adopted daughter.
But the Veterans of Russia movement is not satisfied that Memorial was banned on formal grounds. “Veterans” demanded that she be held accountable for “denying the facts of the crimes of Nazi collaborators.” According to the chairman of Veterans of Russia, Ildar Rezyapov, members of the movement found 19 Nazi criminals on the lists of “repressed” on the Memorial website.
Representatives of “Veterans” tried to picket outside the courthouse today, but the police asked them to leave.
But several dozen Memorial supporters milled around unhindered. When it became known about the decision, they chanted “Shame!” in front of the cameras for several minutes.
Patriotic circles are not happy with the state’s too soft attitude towards Memorial.
“And I sincerely don’t understand, are we embarrassed by someone? Why not recognize this vomit as extremist and destroy their entire infrastructure? “Memorial” and others like them have been twisting the brains of our children for decades, turning them into zombies without a past or present. Then we are surprised that the Eternal Flame for them is just a waste of money on gas and a place where they can “relieve themselves,” political scientist Sergei Karnaukhov wrote in his Telegram channel.
RT journalist Maxim Kononenko agrees with him.
“The Memorial, of course, is no longer an organization that compiles lists of those repressed. And an organization that protects terrorists. And it’s quite strange that the prosecutor’s office accuses Memorial of accusing Russia of being a terrorist state. I haven't seen anything like this. I saw that Memorial protects terrorists. These are not those four who accidentally ended up on the list of repressed Nazi criminals - but actually terrorists. Well, that is, I’m not at all sorry if this organization is closed. She's not needed. All the lists have been compiled,” Kononenko said.
Political scientist Alexey Mukhin explains that Memorial, with the support of the West, was engaged in whitewashing extremist and terrorist organizations in the Russian Federation.
“He enjoys the corporate protection of all those who supported the White Helmets, ISIS militants (an organization banned in the Russian Federation) under the guise of “rebels” and other barmalei, today he stands in the position of the offended. Although, it would seem, there should be no reason for offense: media support for banned organizations - such as the extremist Jehovah's Witnesses (also banned in Germany, by the way) and the openly terrorist Hizb ut-Tahir al-Islami - could not remain without response from the state. And she didn’t stay. Why bother whining if, on a signal from abroad, you are engaged in illegal activities?” Mukhin wrote.
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