Press Release, 22.06.2020

Photo: Anna Cherepanova on a single picket.

On June 11, the European Court of Human Rights communicated the complaint of the Novgorod branch of the Yabloko party in the case of contestation of the results of the elections to the Novgorod Regional Duma in 2016.

Anna Cherepanova, Chair of the Novgorod branch of Yabloko and deputy of the Veliky Novgorod Duma, recalled that in 2016, the list of Novgorod Yabloko to the regional Duma, which she topped, gained 4.83% of the vote. Yabloko lacked 0.17%, or about 300 votes, to get a mandate to the regional parliament. The authorities did everything so that the Yabloko would not get into the regional Duma.

“During the election campaign, the Novgorod authorities violated the right guaranteed of Yabloko by law to place free campaign materials on television and radio and in regional newspapers. The former Governor was furious when he saw a point of the Yabloko programme – “to send Mitin’s team to resignation and form a responsible and effective government”. The Agency of Information Communications demanded [from Yabloko] to change the programme, and when Yabloko refused to do so, they removed the party’s programme from publication. The Russian Post at the last moment refused to distribute Yabloko’s campaign newspaper in the regions.

The regional television launch a campaign against the Yabloko list. On the eve of the election day, the former Chairman of the regional branch, Ivan Gavrilov, “exposed” and urged not to vote for the Novgorod Yabloko,” the leader of the Novgorod Yabloko recalled.

“We tried to dispute the results of those elections in Russian courts, but in vain. The European Court of Human Rights recognised our complaint as well-founded and began the proceedings, finding a violation of the party’s right to free elections and freedom of speech,” Anna Cherepanova said.

“With the adoption of Putin’s constitutional amendments, Russian citizens will lose the opportunity to defend their violated rights in the European Court. The Russian Federation will not execute the decisions [of the ECHR], guided by the priority of the Russian law over the international law. This is also why Yabloko is against Putin’s amendments to the Constitution,” Cherepanova emphasised.

It should be noted that “communicate a complaint” in the procedural practice of the European Court means the procedure for forwarding a complaint to the state whose actions are appealed against in order to familiarise and submit written comments on it to the Court.