Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Thursday protested the targeting of Vitaliy Shabunin, co-founder of the Anti-Corruption Action Center (AntAC), by Ukraine’s State Bureau of Investigation (SBI). Shabunin, “a prominent anti-corruption activist who has played a key role in exposing allegations of government corruption,” recently criticized the Ministry of Defense and the president over weapon procurement [...]

Human Rights Watch (HRW) on Tuesday classified the Kazakhstan Foreign Affairs Ministry’s withholding of accreditation from 16 Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty Kazakh service journalists as a “blatant” attack on independent media. The Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch, Hugh Walliamson, expressed concern about the evident escalation of stifled independent voices in [...]

A Moscow court fined the bookstore Falalster 800,000 rubles (approximately $10,000) and its founder, Boris Kupriyanov, 100,000 rubles (approximately $1,300) on the charges of LGBTQA+ “propaganda,” according to local media. Charges were reportedly based on the bookstore selling books like More Happy Than Not by Adam Silvera, Satanic Feminism by Per Faxneld, Fruit of Knowledge by [...]

The UK announced new sanctions Friday against Russia, directed at three units of the Russian military intelligence agency GRU and 18 military intelligence officers “responsible for spreading chaos and disorder on Putin’s orders” and malicious cyber activity over many years, according to local media. According to the UK, the GRU “routinely uses cyber and information [...]

A Russian military court sentenced a prisoner to an additional six years of imprisonment and a fine of 49,000 rubles (approximately $600) on the charges of public calls to terrorism and the spread of “war fakes,” according to local media. The charges against the prisoner, a man named Andrey Voronin, are based on his conversations [...]

A Russian military court sentenced a defected soldier to 23 years of imprisonment and imposed a fine of 590,000 rubles (approximately $7,500), according to local media. Anton Hozhaev faced charges of “performance management” of a terrorist organization, treason, legalization of funds obtained by criminal means, and defection.  Hozhaev attended military school until he resigned in [...]

The Moscow court sentenced on Tuesday a father of five to three years of imprisonment on the charges of financing a terrorist organization. Dmitry Marsov was arrested in April this year for donating to the Anti-Corruption Foundation once a month from August to December 2021, totaling 1500 rubles (approximately $20). The Anti-Corruption Foundation, an organization [...]

Moscow’s Military Court sentenced a Russian writer to 14 years of imprisonment in absentia on Monday for failing to follow “foreign agent” regulations, facilitating terroristic activity, and justifying terrorism. Writer Boris Akunin, whose real name is Grigori Chkhartishvili, was also fined 400,000 rubles (approximately $5,000), prohibited from managing webpages for four years following the end [...]

The UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Russia on Wednesday condemned the detention of a human rights lawyer from Kaliningrad, saying her arrest appeared to be retaliation for defending political prisoners. The case centers on Maria Bontsler, a 64-year-old human rights lawyer with a chronic medical condition. Rapporteur Mariana Katzarova said in a statement [...]

Russian election watchdog group Golos announced Tuesday of termination of its work, citing the sentencing of Grigory Melkonyants, an election expert, as a core reason. In 2013, the Ministry of Justice identified Golos, which had operated in Russia since the early 2000s, as a “foreign agent.” In the declaration, Golos shared that it only recently [...]