Politically motivated justice and political prisoners in contemporary Russia
Exposition at the AndreiSakharovMuseum and Civic Center
February22 – April2, 2006.
The exhibit’s organizers:the Andrei Sakharov Museum and Civic Center, the Moscow Helsinki Watch Group, Civic Participation committee, Institute for Human Rights, the All-RussiaCivic Movement for Human Rights, Civic Committee for Defense of Scientists, the human rights center Memorial, Andrei Sakharov Foundation (Russia)
This touches everybody
First they came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up,
because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up,
because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left
to speak up for me.
Rev. Martin Niemöller
a GermanLutheran pastor who was an opponent of Adolf Hitler
People to whom this exhibition is dedicated are political prisoners of contemporary Russia. These people are very unlike each other and many appear incompatible. There are very young and there are old among them. Some are deeply devoted, while others are either atheists or agnostics. There are followers of various political ideologies, and there are those not interested in politics at all. There are former officers of secret services, and there are members of opposition parties and movements. There are people without a high school diploma, college students, prominent scientists, and recognized experts in various fields. Some have acquired gigantic fortunes, other were struggling to win their daily bread. There are those who devoted their lives to the struggle for freedom and human rights, and those who dream about a global Islamic Caliphate. There are those whose views and outlook we, organizers of the exposition, share, and those whose views are deeply abhorrent to us.
Yet, despite all these differences, all featured in this exposition share the same fate: all of them have become, in one way or another, victims of politically motivated and arbitrary exercise of state power. All of them have become, within the same short historical period, new Russian political prisoners.
It is self evident that since this happened to THEM, the same could happen today in Russia to ANYBODY.
Anybody, whether he or she is rich or poor, politically active or politically indifferent, educated or poorly educated, a believer or an atheist, a Christian or Muslim, a Russian or a Chechen, or a Tatar, could find himself or herself in the same plight.
The exhibit’s organizers are convinced that the fact that there are now in Russia political prisoners and prisoners of conscience is a menacing sign of collapse of civil society in Russia that has become a fait accompli.
On January 15, 2006, at the conference “Politically motivated court trials in contemporary Russia” that took place at the Andrei Sakharov Museum and Civic Center, there was presented a great amount of material demonstrating that the society does not control the state, and the state cannot or does not want to cease behaving in arbitrary ways.
And if there are no mechanisms created to put brakes on abuse of power by the state, if there is no opposition to the abuses, if the society does not rise in protest and does not say “Stop”, the abuses will never end.
We want this exhibit to express our position. We cannot remain silent about plight of these individuals whether we like them or not, whether we approve of them or not, whether or not we share their views. We speak of these individuals not because we either want to support their views or actions, or to argue against them, but because they have become victims of politically motivated justice.
The main subject of the exposition is politically motivated justice in Russia. We believe it deserves to be celebrated by special postal stamps. The stamps are presented at this exhibit(artist - Alehander Kholopov), as well as brief notes on those depicted there, on the biased court sentences they have received, and on criminal cases fabricated against them.A necessary and essential part of the exhibit are specially prepared booklets presenting analysis ofthe servile Russian justiceand describing actions in defense of Russian political prisoners. There are also supplementary exhibit items displayed separately to complement the main exposition.
Members of the Orginizing Committee: L. Alekseeva, S. Gannushkina, S. Kovalev, O. Orlov, V.Ponomarev, L. Ponomarev, E. Ryabinina, Yu. Samodurov, E. Chernyi.
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