Stop the Untouchables. Justice for Sergei Magnitsky.

Russian-American Voters Address members of Congress to Support Magnitsky Act

American Russian Speaking Association

American Russian-Speaking Association for Civil & Human Rights with its friends and allies mark the Day of Political Prisoners with online campaign in a dozen of states

October 30 is observed by many Russians around the world as the Day of Political Prisoners. It was introduced in 1974 in Soviet labor camps by human rights advocate and author Kronid Lyubarsky and a hero of the Soviet Jewry struggle for the right to emigrate Alexey Murzhenko. In 1991, Russian parliament officially recognized it as the national Day of Remembrance of Victims of Political Repressions.

20 years later, Russia is losing, at an ever increasing speed, the last vestiges of its democratic accomplishments of the 1990s, for which Soviet-era human rights defenders paid a heavy price. According to The Memorial Society, Russia’s most authoritative source of human rights information and research, there are currently about 80 people in jail or under prosecution for political reasons, even if official charges against some of them are of a different nature.

This situation has a negative impact on Russia’s neighbors, where authoritarian regimes are also increasingly persecuting their opponents, and poses a threat to international peace and security. It also increases pressure for emigration from Russia, a country which is currently the 7th largest source of asylum seekers in the world. Over the past two years, the number of Russians granted asylum in the United States increased by 35 percent.