All posts tagged: political prisoners

An American Teacher Went to Ukraine. Now He’s in a Russian Prison.

An American Teacher Went to Ukraine. Now He’s in a Russian Prison.

Published by Sam

Stephen James Hubbard left America behind decades ago, first for Japan, then Cyprus and finally Ukraine. He didn’t like the government — any government, really. He was a wanderer, growing up in a small town in Michigan and traveling the world before ending up alone in the eastern Ukrainian town of Izium when the Russians invaded on Feb. 24, 2022. Now Mr. Hubbard, a retired English teacher who turns 73 on Thursday, has become an unlikely pawn in an international war. The Russians arrested him shortly after invading and accused him of fighting for Ukraine. They moved him to at least five different Russian detention centers before putting him on trial on a charge of being a mercenary. In October, a Moscow court convicted him and sentenced him to almost seven years in a penal colony. His case has remained mostly under the radar. But last month the State Department said Mr. Hubbard was “wrongfully detained” — elevating his case and indicating that the United States believes that the charges are fabricated. A State Department …

US reimposes sanctions on Venezuela as Maduro continues opposition crackdown

US reimposes sanctions on Venezuela as Maduro continues opposition crackdown

Published by Sam

The United States said Wednesday it will snap back sanctions on Venezuela’s crucial oil industry after President Nicolas Maduro’s government continued its repression of opponents. Issued on: 17/04/2024 – 23:31Modified: 18/04/2024 – 01:57 3 min President Joe Biden’s administration suspended some sanctions after Maduro’s government and the opposition agreed in Barbados last October to hold a free and fair vote in 2024 under the watchful eye of international observers. But the thaw ended when Maduro’s opponents were not allowed to run against him in elections, and the United States said Caracas had now failed to make progress ahead of an April 18 deadline. “We are concerned that Maduro and his representatives prevented the democratic opposition from registering the candidate of their choice, harassed and intimidated political opponents, and unjustly detained numerous political actors and members of civil society,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said in a statement. “We again call on Maduro to allow all candidates and parties to participate in the electoral process and release all political prisoners without restrictions or delay.” Oil companies …

Russia jails veteran activist Orlov of Nobel-winning Memorial rights group

Russia jails veteran activist Orlov of Nobel-winning Memorial rights group

Published by Sam

A Russian court on Tuesday sentenced top human rights campaigner Oleg Orlov to two and a half years in jail for denouncing Russia’s assault on Ukraine. Issued on: 27/02/2024 – 11:56 1 min The 70-year-old, a key figure of the Nobel Prize-winning Memorial group, is the latest target of Kremlin repression, which has intensified since the offensive in Ukraine. “The court has determined Orlov’s guilt and orders a sentence of two years and six months… in a general regime penal colony,” the judge said. As the judge read the verdict, the bespectacled, white-haired activist winked at his wife, fellow activist Tatyana. He was taken into custody in the courtroom and asked Tatyana to come over. “Tanya, you promised me!” he told her as she appeared to tear up. Around 200 supporters were waiting in the corridor outside the courtroom to bid him goodbye.  Orlov had told AFP in a recent interview that he held no illusions on the outcome of the trial. Orlov was accused of discrediting the Russian army in a column written for …

European countries summon Russian diplomats over Navalny’s death

European countries summon Russian diplomats over Navalny’s death

Published by Sam

A host of European governments Monday summoned Russian diplomats following the prison death of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.  Issued on: 19/02/2024 – 23:38 1 min French Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne said during a visit to Argentina that Russia’s ambassador in Paris would be summoned, while Norway’s foreign ministry issued a statement that it was calling on its top Russian diplomat “for a talk” about Navalny’s death.  “In the conversation, Norwegian views will be conveyed about Russian authorities’ responsibility for the death and for facilitating a transparent investigation,” Norway said, adding that the meeting had not yet taken place but would shortly. It followed similar announcements earlier Monday by Finland, Germany, Lithuania, Spain, Sweden and the Netherlands saying they have summoned diplomats from Russian embassies. London had done the same Friday evening.  Navalny’s death in a remote prison in the Arctic, where the 47-year-old was serving a 19-year sentence after surviving a 2020 poisoning that he blamed on the Kremlin, was announced Friday.  “The regime of Vladimir Putin has once again shown its true nature,” …

EU diplomacy chief tells Navalny’s widow that Putin will be held accountable for his death

EU diplomacy chief tells Navalny’s widow that Putin will be held accountable for his death

Published by Sam

EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell Monday pledged that Russian President Vladimir Putin would be held to account for Alexei Navalny’s death after he met the opposition leader and Kremlin foe’s widow. Issued on: 19/02/2024 – 10:02Modified: 19/02/2024 – 16:58 2 min Navalny’s death in an Arctic prison last week has shocked Russia’s exiled opposition which – along with the West – pointed the finger at the Kremlin.  “We expressed the EU’s deepest condolences to Yulia Navalnaya. Vladimir Putin and his regime will be held accountable for the death of Alexei Navalny,” Josep Borrell wrote on X. We expressed the EU’s deepest condolences to Yulia Navalnaya Vladimir Putin & his regime will be held accountable for the death of Alexei @navalny As Yulia said, Putin is not Russia. Russia is not Putin We will continue our support to Russia’s civil society & independent media pic.twitter.com/LbXNerR9nI — Josep Borrell Fontelles (@JosepBorrellF) February 19, 2024 “As Yulia said, Putin is not Russia. Russia is not Putin. We will continue our support to Russia’s civil society and independent media.” Navalnaya addressed …

Alexei Navalny’s Last Laugh – The Atlantic

Alexei Navalny’s Last Laugh – The Atlantic

Published by skeptic

A dark, satiric sensibility is a basic qualification for anyone in the Russian opposition. Those leaders I knew in Moscow, before I left Russia in 2022, liked to crack jokes during interviews with journalists and to judges at court hearings. Boris Nemtsov, though he had been arrested many times and knew he should worry for his life, would laugh at President Vladimir Putin’s Russia as the “gangster state of absurdity.” He told the story of the time pro-Putin activists had sent a prostitute to his vacation hotel in a bungled attempt to fabricate kompromat. In 2015, Nemtsov was shot in his back as he strolled across a bridge near the Kremlin. Some of his associates thought that it was, in the end, his mockery of Putin that had marked him out as a target for assassination. (Nemtsov and I shared a name, but we were not related.) When I learned of Alexei Navalny’s death in prison on Friday, I posted on social media a picture of him with Nemtsov: both with big, radiant smiles, standing …

a daring Kremlin critic dies behind bars

a daring Kremlin critic dies behind bars

Published by Sam

Anti-corruption campaigner Alexei Navalny, whose death in a remote Arctic prison was announced on Friday, was long the most prominent face of Russian opposition to President Vladimir Putin. Long a thorn in Putin’s side, Navalny was so loathed by the Kremlin leader that he refused to mention him by name. The 47-year-old was for over a decade Putin’s most vociferous critic, running against the long-time ruler in 2018 and frequently blasting what he perceived as rampant corruption under his watch. Part of a class of younger leaders seeking democratic change after years of post-Soviet oligarchy, Navalny leveraged fatigue with the Kremlin to gain millions of followers on social media. He continued to defy Putin even as most other dissidents fled abroad. But after returning to Russia from Germany, where he had been recovering from a near-fatal poisoning attack that he said was orchestrated by the Kremlin, Navalny was locked up in 2021. During his time behind bars, he appeared in grainy videos from makeshift court hearings, directing much of his criticism at the offensive in …

Senegal court rules govt’s postponement of Feb. 25 presidential poll was illegal

Senegal court rules govt’s postponement of Feb. 25 presidential poll was illegal

Published by Sam

Senegal’s top election authority on Thursday voided the president’s postponement of a presidential election scheduled for February 25 and its rescheduling for December, ruling that the moves were unconstitutional.  Issued on: 15/02/2024 – 22:11Modified: 16/02/2024 – 10:58 2 min Senegal’s Constitutional Council cancelled the decree signed by President Macky Sall that postponed the election, according to a judgement approved by seven members of the body. The National Assembly’s move on February 5 to reschedule the vote for December 14 also was “contrary to the constitution”, the judgement said. Opposition presidential candidates and lawmakers had filed a number of legal challenges to last week’s parliamentary bill, which also extended President Macky Sall’s mandate in what critics said amounted to an “institutional coup”. 02:38 Sall, who has been in power since 2012, sparked uproar on February 3 when he called off the elections over disputes about the disqualification of potential candidates and concern about a repeat of the unrest seen in 2021 and 2023. Read moreSenegal’s democratic record on the line as presidential vote delay sparks crisis …

Russia and Ukraine exchange hundreds of war prisoners

Russia and Ukraine exchange hundreds of war prisoners

Published by Sam

Russia and Ukraine exchanged hundreds of prisoners of war on Wednesday, just a week after Moscow said Kyiv had shot down a plane carrying dozens of captured Ukrainian soldiers. Issued on: 31/01/2024 – 14:30 1 min Russia’s defence ministry said 195 of its soldiers were freed, while Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said 207 people—both soldiers and civilians—had returned to Ukraine. “Our people are back. 207 of them. We return them home no matter what,” Zelensky said in a social media post. Russia’s defence ministry meanwhile said “195 Russian servicemen… were returned home”. Uncertainty remains over the circumstances of last week’s crash, in which a Russian Il-76 military cargo plane was downed in a field near its western border with Ukraine. 02:07 Moscow says that 65 Ukrainian POWs being carried to a scheduled exchange were killed and that the plane was shot down by Kyiv’s forces. Kyiv has not outright denied Moscow’s version of events but questioned whether captured Ukrainian soldiers were actually on board, and called for Moscow to publish photos of their bodies or …

Iran’s Proxies Are Out of Control

Iran’s Proxies Are Out of Control

Published by skeptic

Iran and the United States have been in a shadow war with each other for years. That the conflict has never spilled into all-out war is only because both countries have kept to certain unwritten red lines and rules of engagement. One such rule, rarely broken in recent years, is: Thou Shall Not Kill an American Soldier. Even in January 2020, when a U.S. strike killed Qassem Soleimani, Iran’s most important military figure, the Iranian response didn’t lead to a single U.S. fatality. The tit for tat that had led to the assassination had included the killing of a U.S. contractor, but no U.S. soldiers. On Sunday, this line was crossed. Three American soldiers were killed when a drone hit their living quarters in Tower 22, a small outpost in Jordan, near the country’s borders with Iraq and Syria. The attack was claimed by Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella term used by pro-Iran Iraqi Shiite militias that are backed and trained by the Islamic Republic and its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). These militias …