Russia’s courts muzzle human rights group

MOSCOW — A court here abolished the Memorial Human Rights Center on Wednesday in the second ruling in two days against Russia’s most prominent human rights group. Russia’s Supreme Court liquidated another wing of the group, the International Memorial Society, on Tuesday in a decision condemned by global human rights organizations.

The forced closure of both wings of Memorial, Russia’s oldest rights organization, was a sharp blow to rights activists amid the Kremlin’s sweeping crackdown on dissent.

Memorial was formed by dissidents in the final years of the Soviet Union to investigate Soviet-era repression of political prisoners and to expose contemporary rights abuses.

Authorities designated Memorial Human Rights Center a foreign agent in 2014 and the International Memorial Society in 2016. The designation carries onerous requirements on reporting of finances and tagging all written materials including social media posts with a lengthy foreign agent label, and the law is used by authorities to target rights groups, independent journalists and activists.

Human rights advocates said the moves against Memorial sent a warning that activists can be prosecuted for criticizing Russian authorities, supporting the victims of human rights abuses, or even exposing Soviet repression that occurred decades ago.

U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price on Tuesday condemned the closure of the International Memorial Society and urged Russian authorities to stop harassing human rights defenders.

“The closure of Memorial follows a year of rapidly shrinking space for independent civil society, media, and pro-democracy activists in Russia,” he said.

Part of the prosecution’s case against Memorial Human Rights Center was based on the fact that its annual list of political prisoners included some inmates designated by authorities as extremists or terrorists. Prosecutors said this meant the center justified terrorism and extremism.

Last month, the center published a list of 420 political prisoners in Russia but said the true number was probably higher. The list contains a disclaimer that the organization doesn’t endorse the views of individual political prisoners, which include leading opposition figure Alexei Navalny and his associates, as well as Jehovah’s Witnesses, bloggers, anarchists and critics of Russian authorities.

The prosecution also told Judge Mikhail Kazakov at Wednesday’s hearing that Memorial had repeatedly disregarded the law and “grossly violated” the rights of Russian citizens. The prosecution said the Memorial Human Rights Center was partly funded by foreign states and had promoted protests aimed at destabilizing the country. Prosecutors also argued that the center’s list of political prisoners undermined Russians’ confidence in the justice system.

The Memorial Human Rights Center said the case against it was political and lacked any legal basis.

“We know the truth is on our side,” the center tweeted shortly before Wednesday’s hearing. “Memorial is a huge number of people. No liquidation can take this away.”

Memorial advocate Mikhail Biryukov said the organization would appeal Wednesday’s ruling.