Vladimir Putin’s government has resorted to a Soviet-era label to persecute activists, the press, oppositionists and other critical voices in Russia: foreign agent.
The term, which in the days of communism referred to espionage and was used as a justification in the repression of political dissidents, appears in a 2012 Russian law, which determines that NGOs could receive this designation if they participate in political activities and receive foreign funding. Putin’s justification, who has been in power since 2000, was to avoid meddling in Russia’s internal affairs.
Over the years, the law was amended to include any legal or natural person as eligible to receive the label of foreign agent, which opened wide the political end of the legislation.
Those who become the target of this classification are obliged to report their activities to the Ministry of Justice every six months, undergo audits and must mention their status as a foreign agent in any content they publish – which even includes publications on social networks. Individuals on the “list” who do not submit to these controls can be sentenced to up to five years in prison.
Last week, Russia announced the suspension of broadcasts by the German public television station Deutsche Welle on its territory after Germany banned the broadcasts of the Russian channel Russia Today (RT) in German.
In addition, Russia closed the channel’s correspondent service in the country and canceled the work credentials of all its employees. A note from the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs noted that the competent bodies have started a process to declare the German channel as a foreign agent and to draw up a list of those involved in the ban on RT.
These people, including German government officials, whose names have not been released, will be banned from entering Russian territory. Russia claimed that the measures taken to ban RT broadcasts are “destructive” and stressed that the DW veto is the first part of a series of response actions.
The German Media Supervision Commission (ZAK) had banned the broadcasting of RT’s German programming for lack of a licence.
For researcher, increased repression denounces vulnerability
In December, Russia’s Supreme Court had ordered the dissolution of Memorial, the country’s leading human rights organization that preserved the memory of hundreds of thousands of people repressed during the Soviet Union. The NGO had been classified as a foreign agent in 2016.
Other illustrious targets of the classification as a foreign agent were Transparency International, which usually places Russia at the bottom of its annual ranking on corruption and disrespect for human rights (in 2021, it ranked 136 out of 180 countries); members of the punk band Pussy Riot, who criticize Putin and in 2012 were arrested over a protest in a cathedral in Moscow; and lawyer Ivan Pavlov, who defended the foundation of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, arrested last year.
However, for researcher Natia Seskuria, an associate member of the Royal United Services Institute, the fact that Putin is expanding the scope of the foreign agent law is far from a show of force: on the contrary, it “sheds light on the long-term vulnerabilities of the regime”.
“By targeting smaller, more prominent media, the Kremlin hopes to avoid Belarus-style mass protests,” Seskuria said in an article for Foreign Policy. “By closing a necessary safety valve, even as social, economic and political pressures continue to mount, Putin’s strategy could backfire,” he added.
#Russia #Sovietera #label #close #Deutsche #Welle #headquarters #Moscow