The following is our review of the primary and most representative
events relating to misuse of Russia's
anti-extremist legislation in June 2014.
Lawmaking
In late June, a law on combating extremism on the Internet and in finance was signed. Let’s recall that the pertinent bill was first introduced in the Duma in August 2011, but then it was postponed. The bill was adopted in its first reading in July 2013; in June 2014, the bill quickly overcame two more readings and was approved by the senators. Pursuant to the new law, Article 282.3 (financing of extremist activity) was introduced to the Criminal Code. The composition of the article is as follows: "Provision or collection of funds or financial services wittingly intended to finance extremist organization, preparation, and commitment of at least one extremist crime, or for the support of an extremist community or extremist organization" (punishment for this ranges from a fine of three hundred thousand rubles to imprisonment for up to three years in Part 1 and six years in Part 2). Moreover, the law adds the following to Articles 280 and 282: "Information and telecommunications networks, including the "Internet.” This equates the Internet to the media; furthermore, there are amendments to the law "On Countering Extremist Activities", namely in the article describing the role of the different authorities in such activities. This includes the text of Article 13 of the law, in which the procedural deadlines associated with the recognition of extremist materials are established. We do not consider the introduction of a new article in the Criminal Code justified, insofar as financing extremist activities may be regarded as a form of complicity in crimes punishable by anti-extremist articles. From our point of view, equating the Internet to the media in the sense of Articles 280 and 282 is wrong, inasmuch as the information being posted online has a different degree of publicity and may be designed for a narrow range of users. Moreover, the practice of prosecution for unlawful statements online was quite wide until the adoption of this law.
Criminal Prosecution
In mid-June, in Krasnodar Krai a criminal case under Part 1 of Article 282 (inciting national and religious hatred or enmity) was opened against an activist from Armavir known by the online pseudonym Sergei Sergeev. He is accused of publishing records and images with unflattering remarks against Russian Cossacks and Christians on the social network "VKontakte". From our point of view, the coarse statements which attracted the attention of law enforcement agencies can be attributed to hate speech; however, they do not contain pronounced and dangerous appeals, and therefore do not deserve criminal prosecution. Nevertheless, we note that the activist was actually noticed via his aggressive anti-Christian rhetoric on the social network. Sergei Sergeyev himself believes that his public activities served as the true cause of persecution. These activities include supporting the idea of boycotting the Sochi Olympics, speaking out for LGBT equality, participating in environmentalists’ campaigns on the Black Sea coast, and confronting local nationalist organizations.
Earlier in the month, the Soviet District Court of Ulan-Ude began a new examination of a case against Nadezhda Nizovkina and Tatiana Stetsura under Part 1 of Article 282 (incitement of social hatred). Recall that, earlier, Nizovkina consistently sought after the resumption of the examination of the case, insofar as the termination of criminal proceedings on the grounds of non-rehabilitation does not suit her. Activists were accused of distributing leaflets in Ulan-Ude; such leaflets, from the law enforcement agencies’ perspective, form a "negative image" of the Russian military, police officials, individuals working in the investigative agencies, and employees of the FSB and the penal system. We believe that the activists were wrongfully persecuted, insofar as the security personnel are not among the vulnerable social groups demanding protection in the form of anti-extremist legislation. The district court attempted to dismiss the case for the statute of limitations at the end of 2012, but in May the Supreme Court of the Republic of Buryatia decided to reopen the case.
Earlier this month, we learned the answers of the Russian Federation to questions posed by the European Court of Human Rights, which communicated the appeal of the case "Maria Vladimirovna Alyokhina et al. vs. Russia" in December 2013. In general, the complaint has been dismissed as "obviously unjustified." Among other things, the memorandum of the Russian Federation said that the prosecution of punk prayer cannot be considered an attack on the freedom of speech: such an intervention "was of consequential or incidental character in relation to criminal responsibility for the committed crime" and was aimed at protecting the right to freedom of religion for Orthodox Christians. Applicants, according to the Russian side, undoubtedly understood that their speech is connected with the violation of the norms of morality and ethics, and that their choice of venue for the performance may precipitate a negative reaction from the authorities. The applicants were held accountable not for the content of the idea that they wanted to convey, even if it was criticism of the authorities, but for the form of its reports. Moreover, the right to freedom of speech implies an obligation to avoid the affronts of opponents: “Deliberately provocative behavior in a place which is intended for the spiritual needs of believers, and which constitutes one of the symbols of the Russian Orthodox community, certainly undermines tolerance and cannot be considered as the normal, faithful implementation of Convention rights ."
We also note that, in mid-June, the Russian Constitutional Court received a complaint from Nadezhda Tolokonnikova. Tolokonnikova required a check for the compliance of Article 213 (hooliganism) of the Constitution of Russia. From her point of view, the given norm infringes on the freedom of self-expression. Recall that participants in Pussy Riot have been convicted for their actions in Christ the Savior Cathedral under Part 2 of Article 213 (hooliganism committed by a group of persons according to prior agreement motivated by hate). Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina received two years of imprisonment in a penal colony, and Ekaterina Samutsevich was sentenced to two-years’ imprisonment with a probation period of two years. We consider the sentence illegal.
In late June, members of the FSB, Center "E", special forces "Grad" and OMON riot police conducted searches in apartments and dormitories in St. Petersburg, identifying possible participants of "Hizb ut-Tahrir" within the bounds of the investigation of a criminal case under Part 1 of Article 205.5 (organization of the activities of a terrorist organization) and Part 1 of Article 282.2 (organization of the activities of an extremist organization). About two dozen people were arrested. Recall, we consider the accusation of followers of "Hizb ut-Tahrir" of terrorism only on the basis of their party activities (meeting, reading literature, etc.) to be unlawful.
In those days, it was reported that six local people were charged in Chelyabinsk; they were implicated in the case concerning the appearance of banners with quotations from the Koran and leaflets stating "Hizb ut-Tahrir" on the city streets in September 2013. Depending on the extent of their involvement, they are incriminated under Parts 1 and 2 of Article 282 (incitement of hatred or enmity, as well as humiliation of human dignity). Let’s recall, we are talking about the banners stating "Islam is forbidden in Russia" and "Muslims! We are 20 million in Russia, and our Koran is forbidden!” which were hung in connection with the later lifted ban on the Koran in the translation Elmir Kuliev. Obviously, these banners have no signs of extremism. According the investigators, the same people were also distributing leaflets of "Hizb ut-Tahrir", the contents of which we do not know.
Administrative prosecution
In June, six people were fined under Article 20.29 of the Administrative Code for the distribution of wrongfully banned materials, according to our information: in Tyumen and Krasnoyarsk, two followers of Jehovah's Witnesses were prosecuted for distributing brochures deemed extremist; the Mufti of the Yakut village Khandyga was fined allegedly for the distribution of prohibited classical Islamic texts; in Dimitrovgrad in the Ulyanovsk region, a shop owner was sentenced to a fine for selling a collection of prayers "Fortress of the Muslim"; in Mordovia, a resident of one of the villages was fined for reading the medieval religious treatise "Gardens of the Righteous"; in Mari El, a resident of Volzhsk was punished for posting the film "The Miracles of the Koran" on the social network "VKontakte".
In the second half of the month, it was reported that the Tavdа city prosecutor's office filed a case under Part 2 of Article 6.17 of the Administrative Code (violation of legislation to protect children from information harmful to their health and (or) development) against the director of a high school in a village in the Sverdlovsk region. The reason for filing a lawsuit was the fact that the content filters installed on school computers did not provide full protection from access to forbidden information, including extremist materials. This is the first known lawsuit, according to the given article, to be brought to the head of the educational institution. Do note that content filtering software is, as usual, ineffective, and that school staff should not be held responsible for it.
Civil proceedings and other state actions
At the end of the month, it was reported that the Samara Regional Court declared the local organization of Jehovah's Witnesses extremist and ordered its liquidation.
The reason for this decision was the fact that, in February 2014, the community leader Pavel Moskvin was fined under Article 20.29 of the Administrative Code for the distribution of banned Jehovah’s Witnesses materials at prayer meetings. In March, the sentence was confirmed by the Regional Court. In addition, the prosecutor's office issued a warning concerning the organization in the summer of 2013. Let’s recall that, earlier, only one congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses, which was in Taganrog, was eliminated in a similar way. The liquidation of the community gave the local prosecutor's office a formal basis for the prosecution of local believers who are now accused of continuing the activities of an extremist organization. Now, a similar prosecution threatens the Jehovah's Witnesses of Samara.
In June, two attempts were made to challenge the decision of the prosecutor general to block opposition websites. In the Tverskoy district court of Moscow, Pirate Party chairman Pavel Rassudov challenged the blocking of the sites Kasparov.ru, Grani.ru, the "Daily Journal", and Alexei Navalny’s blog. He pointed out in the lawsuit that, in this case, the actions of the prosecutor general, taken without preliminary expert evaluation, lacked a proper basis. He further pointed out that, in general, blocking resources according to the decision of the prosecutor’s office violated the constitutionally guaranteed right to information, as well as the law "On Information, Information Technologies, and Protection of Information." The representative of the prosecutor’s office was unable to answer claims on the unreasonableness of the block and only referred to the fact that the law allows employees of the prosecutor general’s office to make such decisions unilaterally and without consulting experts. The court upheld the position of the prosecutor's office and denied the claim. Rassudov intends to continue challenging the decision of the prosecutor general up to the European Court of Human Rights. Similarly, events unfolded in the New Savinovsky district court of Kazan, which was considering a claim filed by Bulat Muhamedzhanov, who was demanding the recognition of the block on the site Grani.ru as illegal and in violation of his right to free access to information.
In early June, the prosecutor’s office of Birobidzhan announced a warning to the head of the local Jehovah's Witnesses on the impermissibility of violating legislation on counter-extremism for the distribution of prohibited brochures stating “Good News from God” among local residents.
In those days, the chief editor of the Crimean Tatar newspaper "Avdet", Shevket Kaybullaev, was summoned to the prosecutor's office of Simferopol for a check "on the fact of a violation of the requirements of the law of the Russian Federation "On Countering Extremist Activities" by the leadership of a print publication." A warning on the impermissibility of violating the law was announced to the chief editor in the prosecutor's office. The claim, according to Kaybullaev, was raised because of the terms "annexation", "occupation", and "temporary occupation of the Crimea", which were used in the materials of the publication. From our perspective, the discussion concerns the unjustified restriction of the freedom of speech.
In early June, the police twice confiscated banners from Herman Knyazev, a public activist from Nizhny Novgorod, under the pretext of checking "extremism"; Knyazev had hung the banners, which were of the same content, on his own balcony. The banners were inscribed with the words "Lord, deliver Donbass from demons and shooters" on a background of the national flag of Ukraine. The actions of the police, in our view, are unlawful, insofar as one copy is quite enough for conducting the check in this case.
