Human rights defender Oleg Orlov, co-founder of the NGO Memorial, was placed this Friday, February 2 by Moscow on the blacklist of “foreign agents”.
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According to the Russian Justice Ministry, Oleg Orlov opposed the Russian invasion of Ukraine, leaked false information about the government and wrote messages for foreign agents. So many reasons why, according to Moscow, this veteran of dissidence must join the hundreds of other people, human rights activists, opponents or journalists, placed in recent years on the list of foreign agents. This status, created more than ten years ago, implies for the dissident increased surveillance, additional administrative constraints, and requires him to appear with this label in all public communications.
Oleg Orlov, 70 years old, also the subject of legal proceedings for having “discredited” the Russian army, under one of the new laws used by the Russian government to silence dissident voices since the start of its offensive in Ukraine in February 2022. For two years, Oleg Orlov has continued to denounce a war that he describes as “ crime” committed by a fascist regime. Sentenced to a simple fine last year, he saw the verdict overturned in December and the case sent back to the prosecution, which opens the way to a new trial during which he faces three years in prison.
Active since the 1970s, Oleg Orlov has become one of the pillars of Memorial, the main organization fighting in Russia to preserve the memory of Soviet repressions and documenting those of President Vladimir Putin’s Russia. The NGO was dissolved at the end of 2021 by Russian justice, but was then rewarded with the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize.
(With AFP)