Is
Modernisation in Russia Possible? Interview
with Grigory Yavlinsky and Boris Titov by Yury Pronko,
"The Real Time" programme, Radio Finam, May
12, 2010
Photo: Vladimir Kara-Murza / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
Today, the Moscow City Court will consider the appeal of politician Vladimir Kara-Murza against the ruling of the Basmanny District Court of Moscow on the choice of a measure of restraint in the form of detention. Kara-Murza has been in jail since 22 April on trumped-up charges of alleged spreading “fake news” about the Russian army.
Photo: Lyubov Zhiltsova / Photo by pskov.yabloko.ru
The Pechorsky District Court dismissed the case of “discrediting the army” against Lyubov Zhiltsova, a mathematics teacher and a deputy of the Palkinsky District Assembly in the Pskov Region from Yabloko.
On 25 February, Lyubov Zhiltsova published on her personal page on the VKontakte network a photo of herself with a sheet of paper running “No ** ***”. On 18 April, police officers came to her house in the village of Slopygino, Palkinsky District, and drew up an administrative protocol of offense against her for “discrediting the armed forces” (Article 20.3.3 Part 1 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation).
The human rights defender died at the age of 58 on 14 May
Press Release, 17.05.2022
Hundreds of people came to the House of Human Rights in Smolensky Boulevard, Moscow, so that to pay their last respects to Andrei Babushkin: colleagues of Andrei Babushkin in the human rights movement, members of the Presidential Council for Human Rights, including its former and current Chairmen Mikhail Fedotov and Valery Fadeyev, and, certainly, Andrei Babushkin’s friends and colleagues in the Yabloko party, in which he has been a member since 1999.
The 16 of May marks the 70th anniversary of Alexander Konstantinovich Nikitin, Chairman of the Board of the Bellona Environmental Human Rights Centre and Deputy Chairman of the Green Russia Faction of the Yabloko party. Yabloko Chairman Nikolai Rybakov congratulates Alexander Nikitin on his anniversary.
Photo: Andrei Babushkin / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
On 14 May, Andrei Babushkin, a human rights defender and a member of the Yabloko party since 1999, passed away at the age of 58. Yabloko Chairman Nikolai Rybakov, and Grigory Yavlinsky, head of the Federal Political Committee of the party, express their condolences.
Photo: Andrei Babushkin / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
On the night of 14 May, Andrey Vladimirovich Babushkin, a member of the Federal Bureau of the Yabloko party and a member of the Presidential Council for Human Rights, passed away at the age of 58.
Photo: Lev Shlosberg / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
Judge of the Pskov City Court found Lev Shlosberg, a member of the Federal Political Committee of the Yabloko party and Chairman of the Pskov regional branch of Yabloko, guilty of committing an administrative offense under Article 20.3.3 Part 1 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation (“discrediting the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation”) for a video commentary on the Grazhdanin TV channel and imposed a fine of 32,000 roubles.
Photo: Mikhail Afanasyev / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
The Supreme Court of Khakassia left unsatisfied the appeal of the lawyers of Mikhail Afanasyev, Editor-in-Chief of the online media “Noviy Focus” in Khakassia, and a member of the Yabloko party, against the decision of the Abakan City Court on the measure of restraint in the form of detention chosen by court in respect of the journalist.
An inspection conducted by the Public Prosecutor’s Office of St.Petersburg and the district administration after an appeal by Boris Vishnevsky, MP of the Legislative Assembly of St.Petersburg and Deputy Chairman of Yabloko, established that violations of the law on information had taken place in School No. 321. The inspectors found that fourth grade pupils (children about 9 – 10 years of age) were shown a video with scenes of violence from Nikita Mikhalkov’s Besogon TV programme about “Nazism in Ukraine” during the “Feeling of the Motherland” lesson. Previously, the administration of the educational institution claimed that 18+ content had been cut from the film to be shown to pupils in the classroom.
Alexander Shishlov, head of the Yabloko faction in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, appealed to Roman Plugin, head of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia for St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region, with a request to conduct another check into the facts of non-admission of lawyers to those detained at winter actions of protest against the “special military operation”.
The home of Pavel Sychyov, Yabloko candidate for the State Duma and a video blogger, was searched in Voronezh about 6 a.m. The search was carried out within the framework of a criminal case on terrorism – false reports about the mining of a courthouse in Voronezh. The procedural status of Pavel Sychyov in the criminal case is a witness. However, all equipment was confiscated from the activist in spite of the fact that Sychyov had not been not involved in the criminal case.
Photo: Preobrazhenskoye Cemetery, Moscow / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
On 9 May, the leaders and members of the Yabloko party honoured the memory of those who died in the Second World War at the Preobrazhenskoye Cemetery in Moscow. The delegation laid flowers and a wreath at the Military Memorial. This is a traditional annual Yabloko anti-war action in memory of the victims of the Second World War.
Fierce critic of Putin and a former political opponent, Grigory Yavlinsky talks to Index about fear, lies and violence in today’s Russia
Index on Censorship, 05 May 2022,
BY JP O’MALLEY
Russian politician, academic and economist Grigory Yavlinsky, who became known with his plan for a smooth transition from the Soviet regime to a free-market economy. Credit: Пресс-служба Президента Российской Федерации/Wikimedia Commons
Russian liberal politician, economist and professor Grigory Yavlinsky has long been a thorn in the side of Vladimir Putin. As the founder of the Russian United Democratic Party (Yabloko), which was the leading opposition party in post-Soviet Russia, Yavlinsky has campaigned against Putin on several occasions. In 2000 Yavlinsky participated in the Russian presidential elections under the slogan “For Russia without Dictators and Oligarchs.” In 2018, he ran in the presidential elections on an anti-corruption platform.
I first spoke to Yavlinsky in February 2012. In an interview for New Eastern Europe Yavlinsky told me he was preparing, once again, to offer Russian voters an alternative to Putin’s dictatorial reign in the Kremlin. Back then, Yavlinsky remained hopeful. “A non-democratic and corrupt system which has been created by Putin and Yeltsin, requires cardinal changes, and absolutely different politics in Russia today and important events will take place to see this happens in 2012,” Yavlinsky explained. “To change this system we need a political, economic, and moral alternative which would be supported by the people,” he added.
Today, these hopes have vanished. Why, then, do the Russian people still overwhelmingly support Moscow’s war of aggression against Ukraine? I caught up with Yavlinsky and this was the main subject I broached.
On 17 May, Nina Ostanina, a communist MP of the State Duma, plans to ask the Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin at a special meeting of the State Duma dedicated to Moscow deputies who disagreed with the special operation, to deprive them of their deputies’ mandates. According to Ostanina, Sergei Mitorkhin, Yabloko MP of the Moscow City Duma and ex-Chairman of the Yabloko party, should be deprived of his mandate for his sharp public criticism of the special military operation. Ostania also plans to deprive two Moscow municipal deputies – Viktor Kotov and Yevgenia Remizova – of their mandates as they left Russia after the start of the special operation. Ostanina said that a decision would have to be made “on the dismissing these characters from their posts”.
It should be noted that on 13 April, Sergei Mitrokhin, former Chairman of the Yabloko party and an MP of the Moscow City Duma, sharply condemned Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine in response to the demand of the deputy from the Communist Party Alexander Maksimov “to end with Yabloko as a party of ‘national traitors’”. According to Mitrokhin, “All those who support what is happening today as a result of the so-called “special military operation” will bitterly regret it soon, as this so-called “special military operation” will take away hundreds or maybe thousands times more lives than the victims that emerged there for the eight years [of the conflict in Eastern Ukraine], whereas there were victims from both the sides, this fact has been concealed for some reason, [including] that there was a covert support of separatists in the East of Ukraine. But today it is obvious, that they, for the sake of their alleged revenge for these victims, are going to sacrifice much more people, spill the blood of not only Ukrainian citizens, residents of Ukraine and raze Ukrainian cities to the ground, but also kill, we do not know the exact number now, Russian people.”
Photo: Ksenia Sverdlova /Photo from social networks
A protocol on “discrediting the armed forces of the Russian Federation” (Article 20.3.3 Part 1 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation) was drawn up against Ksenia Sverdlova, ex-Chair of the Saratov regional branch of the Yabloko party.
Photo: Boris Vishnevsky and Alexander Shishlov / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
Alexander Shishlov and Boris Vishnevsky, MPs of the Yabloko faction in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, submitted to the St. Petersburg parliament a draft statement on the protection of citizens’ constitutional rights to freedom of information.
Yabloko proposes that the Legislative Assembly should express protest against the restriction of freedom of information and demand immediate abolition of the legislative restrictions for citizens adopted after the start of the “special military operation” to disseminate any information about the events, except for official information, and freely express their opinion under the threat of administrative or criminal punishment.
The local branch of Yabloko in Miass, the Chelyabinsk region, held a May Day march under the slogan “For Peace!”.
Members and supporters of the Miass branch of Yabloko, together with activists of other socio-political organisations who joined Yabloko, marched through the centre of the city with a pacifist slogan written on the poster and held by Valentina Komkova, Chair the local Yabloko branch.
Photo: Nikolai Kuzmin / Photo from social networks
The Pskov City Court fined Nikolai Kuzmin, a municipal deputy from Yabloko, 30,000 roubles under an article about “discrediting the actions of the armed forces of the Russian Federation.”
Photo: Lev Shlosberg / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
A second protocol of violation under Article 20.3.3 Part 1 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation on “discrediting the armed forces” was drawn up against Lev Shlosberg, the leader of the Pskov Yabloko and a member of the Federal Political Committee of the party. This time, the accusations were connected with one of the broadcasts on the Grazhdanin TV channel.
Decision by the Federal Political Committee of Yabloko No. 152, dated 15 April, 2022
Published on 21 April, 2022
Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
A great disaster on the scale of a national catastrophe, threatening the very existence of Russia, happened to our country.
An authoritarian government acting according to Bolshevik models plunged Russia into this disaster.
A fundamental misunderstanding of modern world realities and historical prospects led to an anti-European course, a senseless confrontation with the West and a claim to the right to arbitrarily limit the sovereignty of neighboгrs in the post-Soviet space. This course naturally led to a dead end.
