Press Release, 25.05.2022

Photo: Boris Vishnevsky and Alexander Shishlov / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service

The pro-government majority of St.Petersburg parliament excluded from the agenda of the plenary session Yabloko’s draft statement on the protection of citizens’ rights to freedom of information in the conditions of a “special operation”: 37 parliamentarians voted for the decline of consideration of consider the document introduced by the Yabloko faction, two voted against the decline (only Yabloko), and two abstained.

Deputies from Yabloko Boris Vishnevsky and Alexander Shishlov proposed to their colleagues to express their protest against the restriction of freedom of information and demand the immediate lifting of the legislative bans (adopted after the start of the “special military operation”) for citizens to disseminate any information about the events, except the official information, and to freely express their opinion.

Alexander Shishlov, head of the Yabloko faction, stressed that the new restrictions on freedom of information deprived people of the opportunity to learn the truth about what was happening and created a threat of degradation and degeneration of society.

The draft statement ran that the introduction of legislative changes had already resulted in thousands of administrative and dozens of criminal cases, residents of St.Petersburg had been detained for the slogan “No to War”, and brought to administrative responsibility with the wordings “was holding a poster ”No to War”, thus expressing his opinion  and forming the opinion of other people on the participation of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in the war, and not in a special operation”.

The Yabloko faction considers such a situation to be monstrous for Russia, where criminal liability has been established for public calls to unleash an aggressive war, where several generations grew up under the slogan “if only there were no war.”

Earlier, Alexander Shishlov and Boris Vishnevsky had sent an address to Vyacheslav Volodin, Chairman of the State Duma, and deputies of the State Duma to repeal the laws imposing penalties for protests against the “special operation”.

ALEXANDER SHISHLOV

is head of the Yabloko faction in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, and a member of the Federal Political Committee of the Yabloko party

BORIS VISHNEVSKY

is Deputy Chairman of the Yabloko Party, member of the Yabloko Federal Political Committee and Bureau, and an MP of the Yabloko faction in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg