The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that Russia must pay a total of 32,000 euros ($34,385) in compensation to a demonstrator who was wrongfully arrested.
Welcome to our column, Russia Update, where we will be closely following day-to-day developments in Russia, including the Russian government’s foreign and domestic policies.
The previous issue is here.
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UPDATES BELOW
A reader of the article at Caucasian Knot with the nickname “Nokh” (the name Chechens give themselves) wrote that he did not know Yezhiev, but had received a text message with his wife’s desperate plea regarding his kidnapping. He noted that she appealed openly to Ramzan Kadyrov, Head of the Chechen Republic, and gave her name and number of children, which indicated that she had faith in him and in the innocence of her husband.
Even so, this reader denied that police could be responsible for abductions and claimed Chechnya was now much safer than in the past — although he acknowledged that with police “standing guard on almost every street” and the “situation completely controlled by law-enforcement agencies,” how can someone be kidnapped?
He further asks why university authorities and police appeared to do nothing, and no one sounded the alarm.
— Catherine A. Fitzpatrick
Google mistranslations have worked in the other direction as well. In August 2015, Google Translate was rendering the Ukrainian phrase “revolution of dignity,” referring to the Maidan Revolution, as “political crisis in Ukraine.”
— Catherine A. Fitzpatrick
Dozens of demonstrators were arrested and charged with disobeying orders after riot police themselves unexpectedly blocked a passageway to Bolotnaya Square in Moscow where demonstrators believed their permit entitled them to demonstrate. The authorities used the pretext of the march to search the homes of numerous opposition activists and subject them to trial.
At least 27 people were sentenced to terms up to 4.5 years; some fled the country and one committed suicide abroad.
More than three years after the demonstration, investigators have continued to round up participants; the latest man sentenced, who had attended the demonstration with his father, was not involved in the opposition before the protest.