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December 2021: the Ingush Case, Memorial and OVD-Info, Yuri Dmitriev

Details: 07 January 2022; Diana Fishman

December 2021 saw an increase in repressions against civil society in Russia. Defendants in the politically motivated Ingush case received lengthy prison sentences. Historian Yuri Dmitriev, head of Memorial’s Karelia office, received a harsher sentence. Memorial itself was slated for liquidation per the ruling of Russia’s Supreme Court.

Details: News

CEPA–IMR joint event: COVID-19 and information warfare

Details: 22 December 2021; Liya Wizevich

On December 15, the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), in collaboration with the Institute of Modern Russia (IMR), hosted a panel discussion on the findings and lessons learned from the recently released reports “Jabbed in the Back” and “The Rise and Fall of Sputnik V.” Dalia Bankauskaitė, Ben Dubow, Olga Khvostunova, and Vera Michlin-Shapir shared their views on how Russia and China engaged in information warfare during the COVID-19 pandemic. James Lamond moderated the discussion.

Details: Analysis

New scholarship on Russia presented at the 2021 Virtual ASEEES Convention

Details: 17 December 2021; Liya Wizevich

The virtual sessions of the Annual Convention of the Association of Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (ASEEES) were held on December 1-3, 2021. To understand the current state of scholarship in the field, we review five panels that shared the latest research on Russia: the law on foreign agents, elections and protests, propaganda, and the factors leading to legitimization and support of Putin's rule.

Details: Human Rights

November 2021: Memorial, Sergei Zuyev, Yuri Khovansky

Details: 09 December 2021; Diana Fishman

November was marked by the Russian government’s renewed attacks on civil society. The Prosecutor General’s Office ordered the liquidation of International Memorial and its structures, including the Memorial Human Rights Center. The Moscow City Court changed the pre-trial restrictions of Sergei Zuyev, the provost of the Moscow School for Social and Economic Sciences, who is facing fraud charges, from house arrest to detention, despite his critical health condition. In St Petersburg, video blogger Yuri Khovansky is being persecuted for alleged public justification of terrorism as a result of what was, in his own words, an “ill-fated joke.”

Details: Analysis

From Sputnik V to MIR-19: How Russia is eroding scientific standards and the public trust

Details: 07 December 2021; Vera Michlin-Shapir

In mid-October the Russian Federal Medical Biological Agency (FMBA) announced that by the end of 2021, it intends to register the first Russian-developed medicine against the coronavirus—MIR-19. Parallels between the registration of the first Russian anti-COVID-19 drug and the first registered vaccine, Sputnik V, suggest that Russian authorities have not learned their lesson from the vaccine’s troublesome rollout, and mistakes are to be repeated.

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