April 15, 2013

U R G E N T

Honorable Senator Benjamin Cardin
Honorable Congressman Christopher Smith
Co-chairs of the Helsinki Commission of the American Congress (Committee on Foreign Affairs)

Dear co-chairs of the Helsinki Commission:

Alarming information about the escalation of wide attacks on the Russian NGOs comes every day from Moscow. Almost all powerful inspection departments on the federal and local levels (like Security Service, Prosecutors’ offices, divisions of the Interior Ministry, even Fire Departments, Taxes, Customs, Border Troops, etc.) have been thrown on central Russian and International NGOs (like “Memorial,” Moscow Helsinki Group, Human Rights Movement, “Golos,” Committee Against Tortures, – about 700 according to President Putin) in spite of recent planned examinations. We know of 222 groups across Russia that have been raided. They include religious organizations as well as pro-democracy and human right groups. The religious groups include Catholics, Evangelical Christians, Jews and Muslims. It is a concerted effort by the Putin government to destroy all such groups by applying the iron hand of the state. Raiders even came to the private apartments of the chairs of important NGOs, like Committee Against Tortures. The explanation was delivered by President Putin, – how the new law about “foreign agents” was to be implemented. In an interview to the German mass-media on April 4, 2013, he said that Russian NGOs received about 1 billion dollars during the last 4 months for “their political activity inside the country.” At the same time these NGOs “violated” the new law – they did not recognize themselves as “foreign agents.”

Everybody knows this government is deathly afraid of free expression and the possibility of true democracy and accountability for violations of human rights. Anti-American rhetoric has become part of the official foreign policy. The economic situation is very poor in Russia but its finances are investing in military equipment. Russian diplomats reject almost all Western initiatives for settling peace and stability. Persecution of the honest NGOs will inhibit the development of public society in Russia and deprive the world of truthful information. The purpose of the raids is to spread fear again all over the society. We are witnesses to the micro-Stalinization of all spheres of freedom, culture, and science. We also see the first attempts to undermine the Helsinki Final Act. The key is to help Russian NGOs to survive and to continue to operate. We need to stop their suffocation by the Putin regime.

The UCSJ has been working in the former Soviet Union since 1970 and up until 1991 was the voice of the Refuseniks. UCSJ consistently advocated for freedom of emigration throughout this time. For the last 20 years, we have been the voice of democratic forces and have fought against anti-Semitism and other forms of xenophobia, working as the bridge between Russian and Western public societies.

We hope that your distinguished Commission can inspire the American public and authorities to help Russian (as well as other parts of the FSU) NGOs to continue their important work. In addition, we hope you will influence the American administration to support NGO protection. As the first organizational measures we propose:

• to establish a Crisis Support Group (CSG) in Washington D.C. to coordinate efforts to support the integrity of Russian NGOs and their leadership. We are ready to open our offices in Washington DC to aid in this effort;
• to run special hearings about the Russian fulfillment of the Helsinki Human Rights Documents
• (American Congress, autumn, 2013) with the participation of several Russian NGOs leaders;
• to ask the State Department to include in the Magnitsky List the names of officials who persecute
• NGOs in the present crisis;
• to inform the European Union members about American measures and invite them to join it.

Thank you for your understanding.
Sincerely,

Larry Lerner

President

On March 2, 2013, UCSJ President Larry Lerner and International Director Leonid Stonov had an hour long Skype discussion with the Chair of the Moscow Helsinki Group (MHG), Luidmilla Alexeeva. Alexeeva is a long-term partner of UCSJ. She arrived in the US on March 1, 2013, after being invited by Senator Benjamin Cardin, chairman of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), also known as the U.S. Helsinki Commission. During her stay in the US, Alexeeva will have meetings with many key members of Congress and the human rights community.

During the Skype conference, Alexeeva described the severely deteriorating human rights situation in Russia. She cited the detention and arrests of participants of peaceful meetings and rallies and spoke about the many difficulties that NGOs face today. These range from issues with registration to the regular tortures occurring in police stations and jails. In addition, she described other problems such as the censorship and control of information, increasing extremism and the threat of the new “agents of influence” law that can prevent NGOs from receiving foreign grants.

MHG continues to support UCSJ’s monitoring of antisemitism and xenophobia, as well as our advocacy for the victims of such abuse. MHG permits us to use their network for this monitoring. Alexeeva also stressed that the West needs to improve its collection and dissemination of information regarding mass violence against human rights workers in Russia. UCSJ promised to help with this issue.

UCSJ and Alexeeva also spoke about the Crisis Support Center that we run in our office in Washington D.C. The CSG works to help threatened members of the human rights movements.

Finally, the UCSJ leadership congratulated Alexeeva on her nomination for the Nobel Peace Price (together with Belarusian activist and political prisoner Ales Belyatski) and expressed full support for this nomination.

Dec 14 (Reuters) – President Barack Obama on Friday signed into law a bill that modernizes U.S. trade relations with Russia by ending a Cold War-era provision, but also punishes Russian human rights violators.

Russia has objected strongly to the human rights component of the legislation named after Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian anti-corruption lawyer who died in 2009 in a Russian jail.

On Friday, the lower house of Russia’s parliament gave preliminary approval to a tit-for-tat measure against U.S. human rights violators.

President Obama has signed the Magnitsky bill, which passed in Congress by significant numbers.  It is a great victory for human rights and for the UCSJ.  Last August, the UCSJ gathered ten human rights groups and many individuals all of whom signed on to a letter to over 150 US Senators and Congressmen of both parties.  As a result of that push, we were able to go over the tipping point in support of the Magnitsky bill to replace  Jackson-Vanik.  It is a fantastic achievement which now can hold accountable those who violate  basic human rights  and shows that the UCSJ is still a leader in the fight for the rule of law in the world.

Larry Lerner
President, UCSJ

October 30, 2012

Dear Mr. President:

The Union of Councils for Jews in the Former Soviet Union (UCSJ), an American independent grassroots human rights NGO founded in 1970, strongly protests the continuing persecution of journalists and other activists in Belarus. This policy shows that Belarus authorities openly ignore international treaties, especially the Helsinki Final Act, the European Charter on Human Rights and Articles (including # 19) of the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights.

We firmly object to charges against journalist Andrzej Poczobut, a correspondent of Gazeta Wyborcza, a Polish daily newspaper, and a prominent Polish-Belarusian minority activist. Now he cannot leave Grodno and must register with the police three times a month. He is officially charged with “libeling the President” under Article 367(2) of the Belarus Criminal Code, for 12 written articles that were published in Belarusian independent media. He has written about prisoners of conscience and criticized the authorities’ response to a wave of “silent protests” in Belarus in the summer of 2011. He also protested against the execution of two people in connection with a series of bomb attacks in Belarus. He wrote that the process violated the laws and that their guilt was not proven.

Charges against Mr. Poczobut have not been dropped, and he still faces a prison sentence in Belarus of more than seven years. Mr. Poczobut believes that his arrest in the summer of 2011 is an attempt to intimidate him and prevent him from carrying out his journalistic activity. Mr. Poczobut also received a 3- year suspended prison sentence on July 5, 2011 on the same charges for other newspaper articles.

The UCSJ asks you personally to stop the violence against and persecution of journalists and human rights activists in your country, and that you fulfill all of your official obligations regarding these issues. Immediately retracting all charges against Andrzej Poczobut, Ales Belyatsky and the other political prisoners can be the first step in this direction. We know that the Council of Europe’s policy toward Belarus is dictated by a sincere attitude toward its people and by a desire to support a legal state where the Rule of Law is a priority.

Sincerely,

Larry Lerner
UCSJ President

As UCSJ mentioned in our Letter to President Putin on Behalf of Maxim Efimov, Efimov fled from Russia after getting charged by local prosecutors for publishing an article that compared the Orthodox Church to the largest leading political party. In addition to getting charged, his private apartment was searched, his personal belongings seized and the Petrozavodsk City Court issued a decree to put him in a mental hospital by force after a dubious psychiatric examination. After his departure, Efimov was declared to be on the federal wanted list.

In the meantime he had applied for political asylum in many countries, including the U.S., Ireland, Estonia and Sweden. Estonia was the only country to grant it.

Efimov is quoted as writing, “Estonian President Toomas Ilves shook my hand and said that he was happy his country gave me temporary political asylum, since they respect freedom of speech in Estonia.”

HRW has asked the Russian authorities to bring the guilty people to justice. Russian Ombudsman Vladimir Lukin also has requested that the Ministry of Interior pay attention to these threats. Lokshina believes that these text messages could have included cell phone tracking technology to monitor her calls.

These serious threats were issued before Lokshina’s upcoming visit to Dagestan, and she has decided to cancel the trip as a result. She had previously issued reports about the war in the Caucuses, and had planned to monitor cases of torture and killing without trials for the next HRW report.

The UCSJ requests that the Russian officials defend Tatyana Lokshina and other human rights activists. Rather than interfering, UCSJ believes that these officials ought to help monitor and improve the situation regarding fundamental freedoms.

Larry Lerner, UCSJ President

We support the demands of human rights organizations to cancel the results of the election and initiate new ones under strong monitoring by local and international organizations and media. We were pleased that the protests have been peaceful and cooperative with police.

UCSJ wishes great success to our Russian human rights friends and partners in developing democratic practice, institutions and traditions. We are ready to help them approach these high goals.

This campaign is reminiscent of Hitler’s antisemitic actions after Kristallnacht on the eve of the Second World War or Stalin’s deportation of ethnic groups in the 1940’s. Leading Russian officials were involved in the anti-Tajik propaganda in the run up to deportation, including Russia’s leading health official who claimed that Tajik immigrants are a health risk because they spread diseases.

It may be that the Tajik court sentence was too strong, but officials and lawyers should raise these questions and solve the problems on diplomatic channels. Russia, by terrorizing its Tajik citizens and migrant workers, is in violation of international norms and obligations. We condemn the use of innocent people as hostages and political pawns.

The flame of xenophobia is a dangerous weapon, and we demand that the Russian leadership end their anti-Tajik campaign immediately.

Larry Lerner

President