International and legal defense of NGOs charged with violating the law on NGOs and “performing the functions of a foreign agent”

Representatives of ADC “Memorial” participated in a discussion concerning possible strategies to appeal the implementation of the law on “foreign agents” in Russian courts, which was organized on September 24, 2013 in Moscow by the Human rights centre “Memorial” and the European Human Rights Advocacy Centre (EHRAC). Leading experts in human rights defense took part in the discussion, including professor Philip Leach and professor Bill Bowring who have vast experience in defending human rights in the European Court for Human Rights, as well as the lawyers of Human rights centre “Memorial” and   representatives of Russian NGOs. The main topic of the discussion was the appeal to the ECHR made on behalf of 14 human rights organizations and the possibility and reasonability of other organizations joining this appeal. Participants of the meeting have also discussed the prospect of hearings on the law on “foreign agents” in the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation, the use of international  mechanisms of the United Nations Organization to appeal against persecution of Russian NGOs. All of these topics are of primary importance to ADC “Memorial” as on October 7, 2013 court hearings are scheduled concerning an administrative case against ADC “Memorial” and its director on violating article 19, section 34 of the Code on administrative violations of the Russian Federation (Leninsky district court, 3 p.m.) and on October 14 another court hearing concerning a civil court case initiated by the procurator’s office, based on the same accusation of being involved in political activities on the ground of preparing a human rights report “Roma people, migrants, activists – victims of police arbitrariness” (same court, 2 p.m.) .