The project was prepared “in three weeks in the silence of the offices”
Senator Lyudmila Narusova believes that the bill on combating torture submitted to the State Duma will not help to seriously combat this phenomenon. She said this at a briefing held on December 29.
Photo: Lilia Sharlovskaya
During the briefing, Senator Narusova also spoke about the most fundamental differences between the version of the law prepared by her and her colleagues from what was introduced by Klishas and Krasheninnikov. First of all, it concerns the definition of torture. To them, as it was said, the Duma version of the law suggests not to include the suffering caused duringthe application of legal sanctions or impact, as well as delivered unintentionally. This, it was said at the briefing, “leaves loopholes for arbitrariness.” In addition, the proposed version of the law does not refer to torture suffering caused without the use of physical influence – sleep deprivation, inability to take necessary medications, etc.
In general, Lyudmila Narusova and her colleagues propose to make a number of adjustments to the legislation (criminal procedure, regulating the work of places of deprivation of liberty, etc.) in order, among other things, to make the torture itself meaningless: so that the evidence obtained with their help is not accepted by the courts, and the people who participated in their application could not hide from responsibility. To do this, it is proposed to single out torture as a separatethe composition of a criminal offense, especially grave, since in this case we are talking about an attempt on the rights enshrined in the Constitution, to introduce a three-day period for the provision of a medical report on the condition of an allegedly tortured person, to document in detail the time and reasons for the movement of persons deprived of liberty from cell to cell, to strengthen the responsibility of the heads of relevant institutions for creating conditions for torture.
What were the main events of 2021 in the countries of the former USSR
A difficult year is coming to an end, which in the post-Soviet space began with the cessation of the bloody conflict and the establishment of peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and ends with the expectation of a new war — between Ukraine and Russia. If you look at the map of the CIS, few of the countries passed it easily — in a stable and confident environment. Even Asian statesshaken: the crisis in Afghanistan has affected the situation in these seemingly calm republics. What can we say about Ukraine with its chronic political tremor, post-war Armenia, Moldova at a crossroads or Belarus, which is subject to sanctions. The rating of the most pronounced results of the year is in the material “MK”.
Zelensky’s facial expressions began to surprise. Photo: A frame from the video
The fall of the year
By the end of 2021, the rating of the President of Ukraine, Vladimir Zelensky, collapsed again. What kind of political somersault the former actor-comedian will make in 2022, no one now fully understands — while the arrest of Petro Poroshenko’s predecessor as a “traitor to the motherland” and an attempted coup in relations with Russia are being viewed in January, but this is not accurate.
A year ago, Zelensky entered the new season with a rating that also collapsed to 20%, in January 2021, the Ukrainian authoritative Kiev International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) claimed that 19.2% of Ukrainians who had already decided on a choice were ready to vote for the current president. Then Zelensky came out of the electoral disaster, riding a patriotic agenda, — since February, he began to collect the NSDC andto punish with the help of this illegal mechanism simply by his decrees everything “pro-Russian”: he closed the pool of Viktor Medvedchuk’s TV channels, opened a criminal case against the oligarch himself and by May sent the politician under house arrest, where the leader of the party “Opposition Platform for Life” continues to be until now. Against this background, little by little, but confidently, Vladimir Zelensky’s rating grew to 32% by the summer.
Now Ukrainian patriots have also become disillusioned with Zelensky. The rating has literally rolled down since the president of Ukraine also entered into a hot war with the richest Ukrainian Rinat Akhmetov, and therefore with his highest-rated Ukrainian TV channels. There are three topics on Ukrainian TV right now: the upcoming energy crisis by February, rising prices and a possible war with Russia.
It is already known that on New Year’s Eve Vladimir Zelensky will light up twice in the congratulations of the people and at the New Year’s concert of his humorous Studio Kvartal-95. Political scientists are already betting on the topic of “whether the surname of Poroshenko will sound in the New Year’s greetings of the Ukrainian president”. Most people think so. And 2022, through the efforts of political technologists of the Office of the President of Ukraine, will give Vladimir Zelensky new enemies, and this time it will not be pro-Russian parties and politicians.
“The drop in Zelensky’s ratings cannot be called unexpected, if only because Ukrainian political traditions consist in a drop in the level of support for any government,” says Enrique Menendez, a Ukrainian political scientist, head of the analytical center “Donbass Institute of Regional Policy.” But if we look for a rational explanation, thenseveral explanations come to mind at once. Firstly, the decline in the standard of living of ordinary Ukrainians. Despite the fact that Zelensky is not at all to blame for it. But he promised “the end of the era of poverty”. High inflation, rising tariffs and the lack of real economic growth are factors that will be in effect for a long time, and any government will have to reckon with them.
Two other reasons stand apart: the first is the failure of the sixth president of Ukraine to fulfill his main election promise to end the war in Donbass through negotiations. In any opinion poll, this is the country’s number one problem. The lack of progress in a peaceful settlement is obvious to everyone, and it is not always possible to shift responsibility to Russia.
Secondly, Zelensky was voted for en masse as a president who would bring unity to the country and crack down on the old elites. But neither the first nor the second happened. Petro Poroshenko’s course of aggressive Ukrainization continued, which the voters of the south and east of the country do not like. And the request for social justice was not crowned with either loud landings or changes in the essence of politics. It’s just that now new faces are already associated with corruption.
World of the Year
In November 2020, the second Karabakh war was over. The peaceful year that followed became a crisis year for Armenia. It started with the fact that some buried their children who died in the 44-day war for Karabakh, while others tried to overthrow Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. However, early parliamentary elections were held in Armenia in the summer, in which Pashinyan’s Civil Contract still received the majority of votes. Now, unless something extraordinary happens, he will rule the republic for another 5 years. But ex-President of Armenia Robert Kocharian, who almost ended up behind bars before the war, was able to get into parliament.
“Many analysts assumed that Pashinyan would be able to win the elections. Moreover, the elections were held precisely for the reason that the authorities were confident in the chances of Pashinyan and his team for legitimization. Now they can say that they have an updated mandate of trust. But so far it cannot be said that Pashinyan has restored hislegitimacy. Armenia returned to the situation before 2018, when there was a weak government and a weak opposition. A little more than half of the voters did not participate in the elections, and about 20% of those who voted chose parties that were known in advance that they would not be able to be elected,” Alexander Iskandaryan, head of the Caucasus Institute, told MK.
While Armenia was deciding who was in power and who was a traitor, Azerbaijan began unilaterally “clarifying” the border with its neighbor. From May 12 until the end of 2021, the Azerbaijani army took control of over 41 square kilometers of territories that Yerevan considers its own. We are talking about reservoirs, pastures, dominatingheights and so on. After each new lost piece of land, the opposition accuses Pashinyan of not being able to protect the territorial integrity of the republic. In response, he tries to appeal to Russia, which, according to him, should help protect the Armenian borders within the framework of bilateral agreements and the CSTO.
But the most difficult situation is in Artsakh (the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic), or what is left of it, Stepanakert and several districts with villages. According to the agreement signed on November 9, 2020, the Armenian side withdrew all heavy equipment from there and no longer sends its army there. There are Russian peacekeepers on the perimeter of the self-proclaimed republic, who make sure that the Azerbaijani troops do not solve the Armenian issue in the same way as they solve the border issue with Armenia.
“After the end of the war, relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan develop quite naturally. Baku is trying to choose all the positive results of the war for itself as much as possible. He puts pressure on Yerevan with statements that the Karabakh problem no longer exists, accusing Russia of the fact that the peacekeepers are interferingto settle the Karabakh issue. Although how can it be if it has already been resolved? Armenia has few trump cards, but the process of settling is underway and may take quite a long time. The main reason for this is the suspended state of Karabakh,” Iskandaryan said.
President of the Year
At the beginning of this year, on January 10, 2021, a new president appeared in Kyrgyzstan. During the early elections, Sadyr Zhaparov, released from prison, became the head of state. The Deputy chairman of the Eurasian Generation Foundation, political scientist Igor Shestakov, told about what he managed to bring to the development of the country over the past year:
Of course, this year the largest systemic changes have taken place in Kyrgyzstan, that is, we have moved from a parliamentary republic to a presidential one. In fact, Sadyr Zhaparov put an end to the populist experiment of reformatting the country’s political system into a more realistic format. If we look at successful countries, including in the CIS, these are primarily countries with a presidential form of government.
Moreover, strengthening the role of the president in the country was the initiative of not only Zhaparov himself. This was the desire of many Kyrgyzstanis who wrote about it in social networks when they saw the complete collapse of the parliamentary form of government. The parliament and the government formed by it could not solve the health problems in 2020, they did nothing to make the country pass the covid period with the least losses.
Under President Zhaparov, the first head of Kyrgyzstan, Askar Akayev, was able to fly to his homeland. Photo: press service of the State Security Committee of the Kyrgyz Republic
Throughout the year, the country has faced serious socio-political challenges, because economically we are still in a very difficult situation. We have held five elections in a year, we can say that the electoral cycle was the most active in all the years of Kyrgyzstan’s independence. The last parliamentary elections were expected fromThere was great concern not only in the country itself, but also external wariness on the part of our main partners, including Russia. Zhaparov maximally reduced the influence of the administrative resource and set a clear task so that there was no bribery of voters. As a result, the protest potential after the elections is at zero.
As for corruption in the country, this topic remains relevant throughout the 30 years of independence. There were loud landings under Zhaparov. But, of course, the fight against corruption does not depend only on the president, we need strong public support.
Sanctions of the year
After the presidential elections in Belarus, the country fell under Western sanctions. But it turned out that this is not the limit. The forced landing of the Rayanair plane at Minsk airport caused a new wave of sanctions. Which this time affected the import of potash fertilizers and petroleum products. And the sky over Belarus was completely closed, because Europe banned flights in Belarusian airspace.
In June of this year, another, fourth package of personal sanctions followed from the West, which affected the inner circle of Alexander Lukashenko and himself. And finally, the migration crisis that unfolded on the border of Belarus with the Baltic states and Poland led to the fifth package of sanctions against individuals, as well as major companies, including Belavia, Belorusneft, Belshina, Grodno Azot, and even special forces of the Belarusian border troops.
The landing of the Ryanair plane in Minsk was the reason for the next sanctions. Photo: twitter.com
In response to these actions, Belarus rolled out its sanctions against the European Union, as well as the United States, Canada, Great Britain and other countries. The restrictions affected the importation of products from these countries, including meat, milk, sausage, vegetables and fruits. Summing up all these events, of course, Belarus can be considered a country that in 2021 found itself under the strongest sanctions pressure.
MK talked about this with economist Yaroslav Romanchuk:
The Belarusian authorities, on the one hand, were helped by Moscow’s support, both diplomatic and resource. On the other hand, there is an unprecedented demand from foreign markets for raw materials that Belarus traditionally exports: petroleum products, chemical goods, metals, agricultural products. Therefore, despite the sanctions that were imposed in December 2020, in June and December 2021, exports of goods to the European Union doubled. In addition, the budget was balanced, a trade surplus was achieved, and the Belarusian ruble exchange rate even slightly strengthened.
Yes, the Belarusian authorities have classified almost 35% of the statistics on exported goods, and prices are managed manually. But it is impossible to say that Belarusians began to live worse in gross terms, because there was really more money in the country.
But this combination of circumstances, which was in the hands of Alexander Lukashenko, will be impossible to reproduce in 2022. Moreover, it is quite obvious that the outflow of human capital and the shortfall in foreign investment has accelerated. And sanctions against large industrial enterprises will begin to act more harshly in 2022. In 2022, the country’s economy will be in a state of stagflation, that is, stagnation and high inflation, which in 2021 is around 10%.
US diplomats have called on US President Joe Biden to publish a list of sanctions that Washington will impose in the event of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The appeal was signed by more than two dozen employees of the State Department. Including former US ambassadors to Russia Michael McFaul and Alexander Vershbow.
The appeal was published on its website by the Atlantic Council. This is an analytical center that was founded in 1961 under NATO. The document states that the list should include the main and “most painful” measures that Washington will be ready to apply immediately. Diplomats are confident that this will be the main deterrent for Moscow.
Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden had a phone conversation before the New Year. The dialogue lasted 50 minutes. During the conversation, the American leader threatened Russia with new sanctions because of the situation with Ukraine. Putin replied that this would be a major mistake, since a break in relations could follow after that.
The West has recently been extremely concerned about the alleged “intensification of aggressive actions” at the borders with Ukraine. Moreover, Kiev itself assures that the movements of Russian troops do not pose a serious threat to the territorial integrity of the country. Moscow, in turn, has repeatedly rejected the accusations of Western countries, emphasizing that statements about “aggression” are used as a pretext to deploy more NATO military equipment near the Russian borders.
Colleagues began to notice the excessive touchiness of the president
In Ukraine, once again, freedom of speech has been grossly violated. The President of the Republic, who previously positioned himself as a staunch defender of the rights and freedoms of fellow citizens, put into effect the decision of the National Security and Defense Council (NSDC) dated December 28 of the outgoing year. Under the guise of “countering the information policy of the Russian Federation”, in addition to the ZIK, 112 Ukraine and NewsOne TV channels closed this spring, two more were added to the list of banned ones – First Independent and UkrLive.
A shot from the TV series “Servant of the People”
Following the exception of “objectionable” channels, if you believe the text of the “prohibitive” document, a complete blocking of their financial and economic activities will follow.
The Basic Law of Ukraine, adopted during the reign of Leonid Kuchma, contains neither a hint nor a half-hint about the transfer of the NSDC right to prohibit or block the work of the media. Such decisions are the prerogative of exclusively Ukrainian courts.
Vladimir Zelensky himself stressed in the first years of his rule: no publication or TV channel was banned under him, if only because Vladimir Alexandrovich is “flesh of the flesh” of this very media industry. “Your own in the board”, if in a simple way. The then head of the President’s Office, Andriy Bogdan, claimed: “Zelensky’s team” does not depend at all on the vagaries of the Ukrainian media, they do not really affect domestic politics in Ukraine.
A little over a year later, Vladimir Zelensky’s associates began to note in a low voice the president’s extreme sensitivity to any criticism in the media. 112, News-Van and ZEKE, controlled by prominent Ukrainian politician Viktor Medvedchuk, were the first to get “under the presidential distribution”. Creative teams of suddenly “closed” media became part of the founders of the channel “First Independent”. Alas, at the request of the SBU, this media also had to stop broadcasting to the whole country an hour after the “premiere”…
Since, as it was emphasized earlier, Viktor Medvedchuk’s channels were not closed legally (that is, by a court decision), media lawyers of Ukraine and a number of EU countries joined the work on their return to the air.
A few days ago, the Economic Court of the city of Kiev finally recognized the ban imposed on the “First Independent” as illegal and ordered the relevant technical structures to restore the broadcasting of the TV channel in full.
Vasily Nimchenko described the new decision to stop broadcasting by UkrLive channels and the “First Independent” member of the Opposition Platform – For Life parliamentary faction as “a sign of information raiding and usurpation of power.” Zelensky, Nimchenko believes, has confidently moved to the “level of dictatorship”, he does not hesitate to appropriate both executive and judicial power, while giving himself the right to execute sentences.
Nimchenko’s colleague in the opposition faction, Yuriy Zavgorodny, counted 9 (nine) gross violations of the Constitution of Ukraine in a document signed yesterday by Zelensky. Among them is the violation of freedom of speech and lack of censorship in Ukraine. Zavgorodny drew attention to the fact that, in fact, there was no meeting of the NSDC on December 28… The “eggheads” from the Council under the President of the country will meet only on January 30, that is, tomorrow.
An annoying glitch in the Ukrainian bureaucratic state machinery (when a document is brought to the president for signature with a reference to an event that actually failed) is another proof of the disorder and disorganization prevailing in the Office of the head of state.
As the Kiev political consultant Vladimir Katsman explained to MK, currently both “banned” TV channels are desperately fighting for the right to continue telling compatriots the bitter truth about modern Ukrainian realities. As of the evening of December 29, the authorities managed to disconnect the “First Independent” and UkrLive “from the satellite” and withdraw both media from broadcasting on cable networks.
The end of the war in the Donbas is the main goal of the President of Ukraine, Vladimir Zelensky. He announced this in his New Year’s greetings. According to the Ukrainian leader, the coming year will help to move forward on this issue.
At the same time, the head of state proposed his own way of getting rid of the demarcation line in the Donbas. We need to stop thinking about her. According to Zelensky, the border will disappear on the map when it disappears in the minds of Ukrainian citizens.
The Ukrainian leader recalled that the army reliably protects the country and therefore it is not worth being afraid of an invasion by an external aggressor.
Recall that the military operation in the Donbas was launched by the Ukrainian authorities in 2014. They thus tried to “crush” the self-proclaimed DNR and LNR. Donetsk and Luhansk declared independence after the coup in February 2014. According to the UN, about 13 thousand people have already become victims of the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
PHOTO: press service of the US Presidential Administration
US President Joe Biden said that he reminded Vladimir Putin of the inadmissibility of invading Ukraine. During the telephone conversation, the American leader recalled that the appearance of the Russian military on the territory of a neighboring state would lead to the introduction of new sanctions against Moscow. In addition, after that, the US military presence in Europe will inevitably increase.
The journalists asked Biden whether he believes that a “Russian invasion” of Ukraine has become less likely after this conversation. The American leader evasively replied that Putin had agreed to hold major conferences in Europe and several discussions within the framework of the Russia-NATO Council.
At the same time, the US president added that the head of Russia outlined “some concerns” about NATO, the US and Europe. A number of issues can be discussed at the talks in January.
Biden and Putin had a telephone conversation on Friday night. The conversation lasted 50 minutes. The Kremlin was satisfied with the contact between the presidents of the two countries. According to Moscow, the main topic of the conversation was the upcoming negotiations on security guarantees and the leaders agreed to keep their progress under personal control.
The Moscow City Court liquidated the Memorial Human Rights Center, which the Russian authorities recognized as a foreign agent. The claim of the metropolitan Prosecutor’s office was satisfied. It was hard to expect anything else after the day before the Supreme Court granted a similar lawsuit by the Prosecutor General’s Office on the liquidation of another foreign agent – the International “Memorial”. Both decisions will be appealed.
Photo: moscow-live.ru
These two lawsuits filed in early November with an interval of one day against the oldest Russian human rights organizations, the Moscow City Court and the Supreme Court began considering a month ago. But then they slowed down, moving the substantive analysis to “after December 9,” when the traditional annual meeting of President Putin with members of his Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights was scheduled – apparently in order not to aggravate the already tense background for communication and not to kill hope ahead of time.
The topic of “Memorials” was also discussed at this meeting, but the president did not say anything specific. And after the Armed Forces liquidated the International Memorial on December 28, it was the turn of the Human Rights Center of the same name.
Shouts of “Shame!” greeted the verdict of Judge Mikhail Kazakov on December 29, people gathered on the street outside the Moscow City Court building. Due to covid restrictions, only representatives of the parties were allowed into the meeting room.
On the merits, the case began to be considered on December 23, at the same time, after many hours of disputes, the arguments of the plaintiffs and defenders of the organization entered into the register of “foreign agents” several years ago became known. The Prosecutor’s office believes that Memorial “systematically concealed information about the performance of the function of a foreign agent,” that is, it did not label or label its products properly.
“Due to the fact that you do not indicate that you are a foreign agent, a citizen cannot approach this article critically. This can lead to various consequences, it can cause a depressive state among citizens,” the prosecutor said at the time. It followed from his words that if the material about the victims of Stalin’s repressions, for example, does not indicate that its author is an “agent”, a Russian can believe what he wrote, and, God forbid, will be upset. But if he reads that the work of an “agent” is in front of him, there will be no trust in the content of the material …
Another reason for liquidation, according to the prosecutor’s office, is “justification of terrorism and extremism.” The facts proving this are the inclusion in the list of Russian political prisoners maintained by the Human Rights Center of participants of Islamist organizations recognized as terrorist in Russia, as well as “Jehovah’s Witnesses” (recognized as extremist and banned in Russia) and “Artillery Preparation” (recognized as extremist and banned in Russia). There are even persons convicted of espionage on these lists, the prosecutor noted. According to him, the compilation of such lists in itself is aimed at “forming a negative perception of the judicial system of the Russian Federation.”
And on December 29, speaking in the debate, the prosecutor also said that Memorial conducts its financial activities “non-transparently”, conceals receipt of foreign funding, supports illegal protest actions and the FBK recognized as extremist in Russia, and in general “steadily neglects the laws, grossly violates the rights of citizens.”
Interestingly, the prosecutor’s office did not find any real consequences of the above-mentioned actions of Memorial, but the fact of their commission, in her opinion, creates “a threat of harm to public order and security.”
Memorial was defended by several lawyers and lawyers. The chairman of the Council of the Human Rights Center, Alexander Cherkasov, said that the true reason for the claim, as it became clear during the proceedings– was not the absence of markings on the center’s materials, “this is just an excuse, an excuse.” The main goal, according to him, is “to deprive citizens of access to information.” ProhibitionThe organization, which has been operating in Russia since 1989, “will confirm that political persecution is one of the systemic factors” of Russian politics. By closing human rights organizations, the state, according to Cherkasov, is trying to “break the red flashing light that signals that something is wrong, and not solve the problem itself.”
Lawyer Grigory Vaipan recalled Soviet dissidents who were also persecuted for lists of political prisoners and criticism of Soviet courts, and Russia later recognized this as “political repression.” Memorial, when compiling its lists of political prisoners, always specifically stipulated that the inclusion of certain surnames in them does not mean that the center agrees with their position and approves their activities – it only means that, according to human rights activists, people were convicted for political reasons, the defenders of the Center said.
A representative of the Ministry of Justice (this agency maintains a register of NGOs-foreign agents, monitors their compliance with legal requirements, and supported the prosecutor’s office’s claim) he refused to participate in the debate.
After the meeting, which lasted about three hours, lawyer Mikhail Biryukov told reporters that the court’s decision would be appealed: according to him, the defense did not hear what rights and legitimate interests of citizens were violated by the human rights center. Violations of the labeling rules, which the NGO corrected after their discovery, are disproportionate to the decision to liquidate, Mr. Biryukov believes. And a member of the Council of the human rights center, Yan Rachinsky, promised to sue up to the ECHR, where Memorial’s complaint against the Russian law on foreign agents is awaiting consideration.
The deputy of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Viktor Medvedchuk said that he was forced to leave the country. In his interview with the site 112.ua The head of the political council of the Opposition Platform – For Life party said that he had repeatedly received offers from the administration of President Zelensky to “go for medical treatment” abroad. However, the politician rejected these proposals. Since he does not believe that his health requires such serious steps.
Medvedchuk also said that after the beginning of the criminal prosecution, he was offered several times to give up political activity. In return, they promised “relief in pressure”” However, the oppositionist also refused this offer.
Medvedchuk explained that he considers himself a law-abiding citizen. The attempt to bring him to criminal responsibility is called “criminal activity of officials.”
Now in Ukraine, criminal cases have been initiated against the politician under three articles. Among other things, he is accused of treason. We are talking about the supply of coal from the DPR in late 2014 – early 2015. Party colleagues say that all charges are falsified.
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky announced telephone talks with US President Joe Biden on January 2, 2022. Zelensky wrote about this on his Twitter.
As the head of the Ukrainian state stressed, he is going to coordinate with Biden measures to achieve peace in Ukraine. Zelensky called the United States a strategic partner, and also noted his commitment to the thesis “Nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine.”
The fact that on January 2, 2022, US President Joe Biden will have a telephone conversation with his Ukrainian counterpart Vladimir Zelensky was confirmed by the White House press service. The US administration noted that Biden is going to discuss Washington’s support for Ukraine with Zelensky.
Recall that on the night of Friday, December 31, 2021, US President Joe Biden held telephone talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The two presidents discussed the security guarantees proposed by the Russian side.
Vladimir Zelensky. Photo of the website of the President of Ukraine.
A decree of President Vladimir Zelensky appeared on the website of the Office of the President of Ukraine, which appoints the head of the State Bureau of Investigations.
“Appoint Alexey Alexandrovich Sukhachev as Director of the State Bureau of Investigation for a period of five years,” the text of the decree says.
At one time, Alexey Sukhachev worked as Deputy Head of the Department of the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine. In addition, he served in the foreign intelligence service. Later he was appointed Acting Director of the GBR.
