Press Release, 11.07.2022

Photo: Nikolai Kavkazsky / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service

The Moscow City Court rejected the complaint by Nikolai Kavkazsky, a human rights activist and a member of the Regional Council of the Moscow Yabloko, against the decision of the Basmanny District Court. On 25 June, Kavkazsky was found guilty of “demonstrating extremist symbols” (Article 20.3 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation). Nominated by the Conference of the Moscow Yabloko, the candidate for municipal deputies Nikolai Kavkazsky, will no longer be able to take part in the elections.

It should be noted that the police detained Nikolai Kavkazsky on the afternoon of 24 June in the courtyard of the block of flats where he lives. He spent several hours in the Basmannoye police station, where an administrative protocol was drawn up against him, after which the police took the human rights activist to the Basmanny Court. By the decision of the court Kavkazsky spent ten days of administrative arrest in Special Detention Centre No. 1 in Moscow.

Several more candidates for municipal deputies nominated by Yabloko are under threat of being deprived of their passive suffrage for a period during which they are considered to be subjected to administrative punishment.

Maya Baidakova, head of the legal department in the Council of Deputies of the Yakimanka District in Moscow and candidate for the Moscow municipal election, is serving ten days of arrest under Article 20.3 (“demonstration of extremist symbols”) of the Code of Administrative Offenses.

Andrei Morev, head of the Yakimanka municipal district and Deputy Chair of the Moscow Yabloko, is waiting for a trial under the same Article 20.3 of the Administrative Offenses Code.

Read more about the persecution of Yabloko members after the start of the “special operation”.