Statement by the Yabloko Party Chairman, 15.04.2026

Photo: Lawyers’ representatives after the hearing at Khamovnichesky District Court, Moscow / Photo from social media

The Khamovnichesky District Court of Moscow, acting on a claim brought by the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation, has ruled to revoke the bar status of Alexei Basistov, Dmitry Provadin and Yuly Tay on the grounds of their extended absence from Russia.

This ruling is the first of its kind. For the first time, a court, acting on the initiative of an executive authority, has effectively intervened in an area that the law assigns to the exclusive competence of bar self-governance, and has issued a ruling contrary to the position of the bar association. This is a dangerous precedent, striking at the foundations of the bar’s independence in our country.

The legal profession exists, above all, to defend the individual. It is for this reason that it cannot be incorporated into the administrative vertical or made subject to the will of the executive. Where the independence of the bar is eroded, the space for citizens’ rights inevitably narrows with it.

The Law on the Bar vests exclusive competence in the bodies of the bar association in all matters concerning the revocation of bar status. To disregard this principle is to destroy the balance on which the independence of the legal profession as an institution rests.

The Ministry of Justice, which has no authority to revoke bar status, has effectively acquired the ability to exert pressure on lawyers, thereby intervening in the work of an independent professional body. This is a substitution of the procedure established by law and a direct intrusion by the executive into the domain of bar self-governance.

An extremely dangerous pattern is taking shape: respect for the bar’s autonomy is replaced by subordination; legal assessment of the circumstances — by administrative pressure; the protection of citizens’ right to qualified legal assistance — by a signal to the entire legal profession that outside interference is permissible.

Law exists where power has limits. When the state begins arbitrarily to expand its actual powers, undermining the inviolability of the founding principles that govern professional communities, it negates the very purpose of their existence.

Yabloko considers the violation of the principle of the legal profession’s independence to be inadmissible, and regards the court’s ruling as unconstitutional and wrong. It must be overturned. Bar self-governance cannot be reduced to a formality that may be disregarded at departmental discretion.

Nikolai Rybakov,

Yabloko Chairman