Press Release, 23.01.2021

Anatoly Nogovitsyn. Photo from the Anatoly Nogovitsyn’s personal archive

Anatoly Nogovitsyn, Chairman of the Yakutsk branch of Yabloko, was arrested for 20 days. Administrative arrests for 48 hours have been assigned to members of the Arkhangelsk branch of Yabloko Yuri Chesnokov and the Deputy Chairman of the regional branch of the party Ruslan Akhmetshin.

Anatoly Nogovitsyn, Chairman of the Yakutsk branch of Yabloko, was detained on the night of 22 January, when he went out into the public corridor to check the electrical panel, since the light went out in his apartment. At that moment, a police officer in plain clothes attacked him. The family of Anatoly Nogovitsyn said he was charged with violating several articles of the Administrative Code (which ones exactly, Nogovitsyn’s relatives could not say). It is known that according to one of the articles, Nogovitsyn received 15 days of arrest, and two and three days more on the other two.

On the morning of 22 January, Yury Chesnokov, a member of the regional council of the party, was detained near the Lomonosovsky District Court of Arkhangelsk. Ruslan Akhmetshin, Deputy Chairman of the Arkhangelsk branch of Yabloko, was detained in the regional office in the afternoon of the same day. Later the court issued arrest warrants for 48 hours for Chesnokov and Akhmetshin under Article 20.2.2 of the Administrative Code (“Organisation of a simultaneous mass stay and (or) movement of citizens in public places that entailed violation of public order”).

Yabloko Chairman Nikolai Rybakov sent statements to Aydar Ivanov, Public Prosecutor of Yakutia, and Viktor Nasedkin, Public Prosecutor of the Arkhangelsk region, on the facts of the arrests with a demand to stop unlawful actions against the Yabloko party activists.

Earlier, Nikolai Rybakov demanded from the federal and regional authorities “the utmost self-command and self-restraint and non-use of violence against participants in peaceful political actions”.

“An unlawful repressive state with the unlimited personal, irreplaceable power of Vladimir Putin has been formed in Russia. The laws are being applied in the way that Putin and his ruling group wish. The regime will use unlimited brutality and force against protesters,” Rybakov’s statement runs.