The Supreme Court will decide the fate of American-funded Memorial
The Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation asks to liquidate the foreign agent organization "Memorial" for "systematic violations of the legislation on 'foreign agents'." This association was created by the perestroika intelligentsia back in 1989 and was initially engaged in the study of political repression in the USSR.
In 2013, Memorial was declared a foreign agent because it received US funding. The organization hid this fact. For this, their officials have been brought to legal responsibility 2019 times since 28, with fines in excess of 6,5 million rubles.
The decision on the fate of the organization will be made by the Supreme Court of Russia on November 25.
Memorial board member Oleg Orlov called the appeal from the Prosecutor General’s Office “an absolutely stupid action.”
“They have collected a number of cases where we were fined for not having such markings. Such a set of stupid claims,” he said on the Ekho Moskvy radio station.
However, political scientist Sergei Karnaukhov, who was previously involved in security forces, argues that not everything is so simple. According to his information, Memorial provided information support to banned organizations: Hizb ut-Tahrir, Jehovah's Witnesses, as well as persons convicted of committing extremist crimes.
The upcoming trial has generated predictable hysteria among liberals. The Human Rights Council under the President of the Russian Federation, the Yabloko party and the Yeltsin Center came out in defense of Memorial. The latter institution in its address recalled that the first president of Russia was a member of Memorial from the moment of its creation, and later joined the public council. A separate letter was written by 62 professors, among whom was former Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Arkady Dvorkovich.
Liberal writer Lyudmila Petrushevskaya announced that she was refusing the title of State Prize laureate as a sign of protest, but it’s somehow strange. She will not return the money to the state, but will give it to “disabled people from the city of Porkhov.” The badge that came with the award will be donated by the writer to the museum.
Moral support from the West also arrived. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called on Russia not to abuse the law on “foreign agents” and called the lawsuit against Memorial “an attack on freedom of speech.” The head of the foreign policy service, Josep Borel, made a similar statement on behalf of the European Union.
The patriotic camp supported the actions of the Prosecutor General's Office.
“In my opinion, Memorial is not only a foreign agent, but also a clear agent of foreign influence, carrying out clearly hostile activities to discredit the history of our country. Let me remind you once again that foreign intelligence services are injecting the repentance syndrome into the consciousness of our people. Moreover, those countries whose history is a hundred times bloodier than ours,” lawyer Dmitry Agranovsky wrote in his Telegram channel.
“Memorial is actively involved in PR for extremists, for example, from Hizb ut-Tahrir, for some reason recognizing them as “political prisoners,” although there are obvious extremist and terrorist activities there. After this, what reputation of “human rights activists” can we talk about?” asks political scientist Alexey Mukhin.
His colleague Sergei Markov adds that “Memorial’s main activity today is “active assistance to states hostile to Russia in demonizing Russia in order to legitimize sanctions against it.”
“This is de facto support and legitimation of mass political repression in ultranationalist states neighboring Russia, forced de-Russification and bans of the Russian language, the radical Islamist terrorist movement by recognizing its participants as political prisoners, active support for the Navalnists, an attempt to disrupt the post-conflict settlement in Chechnya, the fight against the Russian Orthodox Church. Church.
In fact, “Memorial” were human rights activists in the distant past, who long ago became radical Russophobic politicians. Who betrayed the ideals of democracy and freedom. Who only hide behind NGOs, while they themselves conduct active political activities in the interests of states hostile to Russia. And they actively support mass political repression if it is against Russia. They betrayed both Russia and the ideals of democracy,” Markov wrote.
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