Press Release, 28.08.2024

Photo: Boris Vishnevsky in the Vasileostrovsky District Court of St.Petersburg / Photo by the regional branch of Yabloko

On 27 August, the trial on the suit of Boris Vishnevsky, a Yabloko deputy of the Legislative Assembly of St.Petersburg and Deputy Chairman of the Yabloko party, against the Ministry of Justice, whose officials unlawfully included him in the register of “foreign agents,” ended.

In four court hearings, the representatives of the Ministry of Justice were unable to indicate (as well as were unable to answer questions from Vishnevsky and his representatives, lawyers Vitaly Isakov and Alexander Kobrinsky), which provision of the Federal Law on “foreign influence” allows the Ministry to consider as “foreign aid” three interviews given by Vishnevsky to Russian journalists working abroad and the fact that he uses YouTube and Facebook, and  include him in the register of “foreign agents” on this basis.

“There is no and has never been such provision in this law, such “grounds” for inclusion in “foreign agents” register are a 100-percent invention of the Ministry of Justice, allowing it to act “at its discretion”, including in the list of “enemies of the people” those who, like me, are undesirable for the authorities – and then deprive them of two dozen civil rights, including constitutional ones,” Vishnevsky said, speaking in the debate during the hearing.

Representatives of Boris Vishnevsky also asked the court to appeal to the Constitutional Court to review the law that affects Russian citizens in their constitutional rights, but the court refused to write a request and did not even provide a preliminary protection measure: according to the new “law”, a foreign agent, if he is a deputy, loses his mandate 180 days after the “law” comes into force. In the case of Boris Vishnevsky, this can happen on 10 November.

Vishnevsky added that, according to the defendants’ logic, the register of “foreign agents” should include not only President Vladimir Putin, but also Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, as well as many State Duma deputies and senators, and, finally, the heads of the Ministry of Justice – after all, they all give interviews and comments, to foreign media inclusive, and use YouTube. However, no one includes them in the register – and this is right, because this fact represents neither “receiving foreign aid”, nor a proof of “foreign influence”.

According to the rules of legal proceedings, in such a process, the Ministry of Justice, as a defendant, had to present evidence that its decision to include Vishnevsky in the register of “foreign agents” was legal, and prove that Vishnevsky was under “foreign influence”, prove it by referring to the norms of the law and to facts, and not relying solely on the “opinion” of its officials who compiled “reports” on Vishnevsky and organised actual surveillance of the city parliament deputy, forming a 100-page dossier from his publications and speeches.

No evidence had been ever presented, but the court did not require it.

“I believe that the court, as in other “foreign agents” trials, was only solving the problem of recognising the legality of political repressions against a politician who was inconvenient to the authorities,” Vishnevsky said after the hearing. “The practices of repression are such that the authorities need to be able to subject anyone to it, and then it would be impossible to restore their violated rights in court. The Vasileostrovsky Court could have started to destroy these vicious practices, but did not dare. We will definitely appeal this decision and go through all the instances, after which we will appeal to the Constitutional Court. Sooner or later, legality and justice will be restored, and not only in my case,” Boris Vishnevsky noted.

BORIS VISHNEVSKY

is Deputy Chairman of the Yabloko Party, member of the Yabloko Federal Political Committee and Bureau, and an MP of the Yabloko faction in the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg