The article by ADC Memorial expert Olga Abramenko in the Moscow Times is devoted to the misuse of anti-terrorist and anti-extremist legislation by the Russian authorities.
A lot of efforts of law enforcement officers and courts have been pretend to be the fight against a real terrorist threat, whose terrible reality the whole world has just seen in Moscow. Instead of effective counter-terrorism measures, the authorities suppress any public protest, freedom of speech and expression, and criticism of the regime.
Within a short time after the terrible terrorist attack in Crocus, Nikolai Konashenok and Alexander Skobov were detained in St. Petersburg for justifying terrorism, and Azat Miftakhov was convicted. Evgenia Berkovich and Svetlana Petriychuk have been detained for many months. All these people are against terrorist crimes, but they are persecuted for expressing their opinions and for anti-war protest.