Union of Journalists of St. Petersburg and Leningrad Region: Judicial decisions to liquidate Memorial are politically motivated and harm civil society

The Union of Journalists of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region is outraged by the court decisions on the liquidation of the International Memorial (recognized in Russia as a non-profit foreign agent – approx. ed.) and the human rights center “Memorial” (recognized in Russia as a non-profit foreign agent – approx. ed.).

As stated in the statement of the chairman and members of the secretariat of the Board of the Union of Journalists of St. Petersburg and Leningrad Region, such decisions “are politically motivated and harm civil society.”

Over the years of their work, these structures have done a tremendous job of collecting and preserving scientific data on the most tragic pages of Russian history of the 20th century, the statement says. The Union also indicated that the activists of the organization act as public defenders in various processes.

“The liquidation of Memorial will lead to an infringement of the rights of Russians to receive information and the opportunity to obtain legal protection,” the Union of Journalists is convinced.

The statement was signed, in particular, by the Chairman of the Union of Journalists of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region Andrey Radin, Deputy Chairman of the Union of Journalists of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region Natalya Cherkesova, secretaries of the Board of the Union of Journalists of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region Peter Godlevsky, Ksenia Klochkova, Andrey Korneev, Alexey Razorenov, Anton Mukhin, as well as the deputy chairman of the Moscow city organization of the UZHR Larisa Shamikova.

Among the journalists who signed the statement are Lev Lurie, Nikolai Nelyubin, Tatyana Likhanova, Elena Volgust, Gleb Stashkov, Maria Romeyko-Gurko, Fedor Shumilov, Mikhail Velikoselsky, Sergei Gulyaev, Mikhail Loginov, Vladimir Petrov.

Let us remind that on the eve of the Supreme Court of Russia satisfied the claim of the Prosecutor General’s Office against the international “Memorial”. The court ruled to liquidate the society and its structural organizations. Today it became known that the Moscow City Court liquidated the human rights center “Memorial” at the suit of the Moscow prosecutor’s office.