Address by Nikolai Rybakov, 9.08.2026

Photo: Banners “The Supreme Court of the RF”

Tomorrow, the Supreme Court of Russia will hear a case on removing the Yabloko party from the State Duma elections.

Rest assured – our lawyers will not leave one stone upon another of these ill-informed and politically motivated accusations against the party. There are no legal grounds whatsoever for denying dozens of millions of Russian citizens who support peace the opportunity to vote for their representatives – for Yabloko. Some of the arguments even raise doubts about the sanity of whoever wrote them.

Calls to come to the courthouse are spreading widely on social media. I know that the vast majority of people posting them are sincere. But I cannot rule out that some may aim to provoke unrest and use it against our party.

Yabloko has always been, and will always be, categorically opposed to any unrest and any provocations. I ask our supporters, tomorrow and always, to remain calm and act strictly within the law. We must not fall for any provocations. Tomorrow is just one day in our lives. It will be followed by long work and a gruelling month and a half of the election campaign. Our shared task is not to fight provocateurs, nor to shout something at the police (it is not the police who want to remove us from the elections), but to fight for people to believe in themselves, to come out and vote, not to lose heart, and to do everything possible to bring back peace. Aggression will not bring back peace!

We will defend citizens’ right to choose by peaceful and lawful means. Most importantly, look after yourselves. Your freedom, health and safety matter to us more than anything.

And importantly, a detailed live text broadcast from the courtroom will be run on the party’s press service channel (https://t.me/yabloko_press), provided mobile internet is not switched off inside the Supreme Court building.