The Supreme Court in Russia banned the human rights organization Memorial on Tuesday, sparking international outrage. The judge joined the attorney general’s office, which had demanded the end of the umbrella organization because of several violations of the law on “foreign agents”. Memorial has categorically rejected such a classification by the Russian Ministry of Justice, but at the same time repeatedly paid corresponding fines. The organization announced that it would appeal the judgment in Russia, ultimately going to the European Court of Human Rights.
Memorial, which was awarded the Alternative Nobel Prize in 2004, was founded in the late 1980s by, among others, the Russian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Andrei Sakharov. It has dedicated itself to coming to terms with Stalinist crimes in particular. Memorial Human Rights Center is also threatened with extinction in another trial that continues this Wednesday in a Moscow court. It supports prisoners who, in its opinion, are imprisoned for political reasons, as well as members of minorities seeking protection.
Russian President Vladimir Putin recognized the high reputation of Memorial on the one hand, but at the same time accused the organization of including people who were involved in murders on its list of victims of Soviet oppression. On Tuesday, the General Prosecutor’s Office accused the human rights organization of creating a false image of the Soviet Union as a terrorist state. It is obvious that Memorial “rehabilitates Nazi criminals whose hands have the blood of Soviet citizens”. Memorial rejected this, stating that it truthfully reported events in the Soviet past. The Russian Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev criticized the lawsuit against Memorial and called for it to be withdrawn.
In a joint declaration, twelve German organizations sharply attacked the court ruling in Moscow. “With the ban on Memorial – the moral backbone of Russian civil society – the Russian state is giving a shocking self-testimony,” it says. He fights “the confrontation with one’s own history of injustice and wants to monopolize individual and collective memory”. The signatories, including the Böll Foundation, the German-Russian Exchange and the Pen Center, spoke of a “politically motivated approach by the Russian judiciary”. The vice-chairman of the social democratic group in the Council of Europe, Axel Schäfer, said the Süddeutsche Zeitung: “The judgment breathes a touch of neo-Stalinism and is a historic turning point in dealing with the opposition in the Putin era.”