The Supreme Court ruling on Thursday came in response to a petition from the Justice Ministry to designate 'the Memorial international civic movement' as extremist and ban its activities in Russia. Memorial said in a statement that there is no such entity as 'the Memorial international civic movement', arguing the ruling would allow the authorities to crack down on any Memorial projects, their participants and supporters. According to Memorial, this extremist designation puts more pressure on the group, as involvement with extremist activities is a criminal offense punishable by long prison terms in Russia. The specific evidence or justification provided by the Russian Justice Ministry in its petition remains unclear, and it is unknown how many members, participants, or supporters are currently at risk of criminal prosecution due to this ruling.
Memorial is one of the oldest and most renowned Russian human rights organizations, founded in the late 1980s to ensure that the victims of the Soviet Union's political repression would be remembered. It was awarded the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize. The Norwegian Nobel Committee condemned the actions against Memorial in a statement on Wednesday.
would allow the authorities to crack down on any Memorial projects, their participants and supporters.
This ruling is part of a broader pattern of legal actions against Memorial in Russia. The group had been declared a 'foreign agent' in Russia, and Russian courts ordered Memorial's two main entities—the human rights center and the International Memorial—to shut down in December 2021. Despite these orders, Memorial continued to operate. In 2023, Memorial members founded an international Memorial association in Geneva. Earlier this year, the Geneva-based association was banned in Russia as 'undesirable'. It is uncertain how this new Supreme Court ruling will affect Memorial's operations outside of Russia, particularly its Geneva-based association. Immediate actions taken by Russian authorities against Memorial or its affiliates following the decision have not been confirmed, and the legal basis or precedent in Russian law for designating a human rights organization as an 'extremist movement' remains ambiguous.