More than 120.5 thousand people signed a petition in support of Memorial | News from Germany about Russia | Dw

The online petition in support of the Memorial Society has collected over 120.5 thousand signatures in just over three weeks. This follows from the constantly updated data on the website Change.org about the petition entitled “Hands off Memorial – let’s stop the liquidation of key civil society organizations!” as of Sunday 5 December.

On November 11, 2021, it became known that the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office filed an administrative lawsuit with the Supreme Court to liquidate the non-profit organization International Memorial, previously recognized as an “foreign agent”, and the Moscow prosecutor’s office filed a similar lawsuit with the Moscow City Court to liquidate the Memorial human rights center. Their elimination may lead to the closure of the most important historical, educational and human rights projects, such as, for example, “OVD-Info” – an information and human rights project to help citizens who have suffered from state persecution for political reasons, the signatories warn.

“Attacks on the defenders of their history and memory”

The authors of the petition call the actions of the prosecutor’s office against Memorial “attacks on organized defenders of their history, memory, essence, rights and freedoms of citizens in the current reality of open political repression by the Russian state.”

Memorial itself believes that the demand of the Prosecutor General’s Office is a “political decision to destroy society,” which deals with “the history of political repression and the protection of human rights.”

The next session of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation on the claim to liquidate International Memorial is scheduled for December 14. A hearing in the Moscow City Court on the liquidation of the human rights center “Memorial” is to be held on December 16.

See also:

• “Perm-36” – a monument to the inglorious past

  “Perm-36” – a monument to the inglorious past

  Hundreds of “especially dangerous state criminals” passed through the camp. Here are just a few names: Vasil Stus, Vladimir Bukovsky, Sergey Kovalev, Valery Marchenko, Natan Sharansky, Gleb Yakunin, Levko Lukyanenko.

• 

  “Perm-36” – a monument to the inglorious past

  Vasil Stus

  Ukrainian poet Vasil Stus was one of the Perm prisoners. Died in 1985. The colony ceased to exist in 1988.

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  “Perm-36” – a monument to the inglorious past

  In the museum

  Initially, most of the prisoners were collaborators – citizens of the USSR who collaborated with the occupation forces during World War II. But gradually they were replaced by those convicted of “anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda.”

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  “Perm-36” – a monument to the inglorious past

  “Zeka Vasiliev i Petrov zeka”

  In the mid-1980s, then Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to massive amnesties for political prisoners. On December 29, 1987, most of the prisoners of the “Perm-36” colony were amnestied.

• 

  “Perm-36” – a monument to the inglorious past

  The wall

  The museum received its first visitors in 1996. Since then, through the efforts of volunteers, including German ones, 15 buildings and structures of the camp and more than two kilometers of camp barriers have been repaired and restored.

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  “Perm-36” – a monument to the inglorious past

  Perfect “coexistence”

  The museum was originally created and has always positioned itself as independent, public. The real estate belonged and continues to belong to the state, although it was provided to the museum for perpetual use at no cost. The money for the maintenance and financing of the museum came from budget funds (not all, but most of it), and the authorities did not interfere with the substantive part of the museum.

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  “Perm-36” – a monument to the inglorious past

  What will happen?

  According to recent statements by representatives of the museum, the state has decided to take back its property and revise the concept of the museum, in fact, “moving” the autonomous non-governmental organization Perm-36, which has been creating and has been working on the public museum for all these years.

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  “Perm-36” – a monument to the inglorious past

  Who will solve the problem?

  Reports that a one-of-a-kind museum located on the territory of a Gulag-era camp complex could dissolve into space excited the public both in Russia and abroad.

  Author: Vitaly Kropman

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