This week our guest on the podcast is Danil Beglets. Danil Beglets is the first defendant in the ‘Moscow case’ convicted to a real sentence to have been released on parole.

Given the length of the podcast, we have also divided it into three sections that you can listen to separately.

Part Two: the penitentiary system; impact of imprisonment on life after release; opinion of human rights defenders; plans for the future.

This week our guest on the podcast is Danil Beglets. Danil Beglets is the first defendant in the ‘Moscow case’ convicted to a real sentence to have been released on parole.

Given the length of the podcast, we have also divided it into three sections that you can listen to separately.

Part One: arrest on 27 July 2019; remanding in custody; conditions in pre-trial detention; trial; conviction; transfer to prison:

The issues we discuss in the podcast include: What happened on 27 July 2019 during the protest over the barring of independent candidates from the Moscow City Duma elections? Why were you detained? What were the conditions in pre-trial detention? What was the trial like? What was the process of transfer to prison like? How has your experience changed you? Did human rights defenders help you? What were the conditions in the penal colony? Is religion respected in the penal colony? How do you evaluate the law enforcement and judicial systems in Russia? What are your plans for the future?

This podcast is in Russian. You can also listen to the podcast on Rights in Russia [https://www.rightsinrussia.org/podcast-9/],  SoundCloud,  Spotify  and  iTunes. 

The music, from Stravinsky’s Elegy for Solo Viola, is performed for us by Karolina Herrera.

Sergei Nikitin writes on Facebook: “I went and found a box, tore off a piece of cardboard and wrote on it – I am NOT a slave. I went to my baracks, got dressed, took a mattress, took a bag of books and sat down in front of the ‘White House’ [the administration building of Mtsensk Colony No. 7]. I put the mattress on the ground, set up the cardboard sign in protest that I am not a slave, sat down, and started reading a book.” Simon Cosgrove and I spent an evening with an unusual guest: Danil Beglets, a self-employed busnessman from Moscow’s Mytishchi district, happened to be on Bolshaya Dmitrovka street on 27 July 2019 where he was caught up in the general confusion during a protest against the barring of independent candidates from the Moscow city Duma elections. He was released on parole on 2 November 2020, a man who has learned what life in a Russian prison is like. He cannot understand why the authorities perpetrate injustice. Danil, whom his former business partner described as ‘kind, open, sometimes too generous, because he helps people who don’t always need to be helped,’ joined the number of human rights defenders who became such by chance. Police cells, remand centres, prison trains, Penal Colony No. 2 in Kostroma region, Penal Colony No. 7 in Mtsensk, Oryol region… It’s all behind him now. Danil lost his business, but he is full of energy: he plans to open a cafe, and now he wants to help people who suffer from the lawlessness behind barbed wire that is the Russian penitentiary system.

Simon Cosgrove adds: If you want to listen to this podcast on the podcasts.com website and it doesn’t seem to play, please download by clicking on the three dots to the right. A summary of some of the week’s events in Russia relevant to human rights can be found on our website here.

This week our guest on the podcast is Lev Markovich Shlosberg. Lev Markovich is a Russian politician, a civil society and human rights activist, and a journalist. He is chair of Yabloko’s Pskov regional branch, a member of Yabloko’s federal political committee and a deputy of Pskov regional legislative assembly from the Yabloko party. 

This week our guest on the podcast is Lev Markovich Shlosberg. Lev Markovich is a Russian politician, a civil society and human rights activist, and a journalist. He is chair of Yabloko’s Pskov regional branch, a member of Yabloko’s federal political committee and a deputy of Pskov regional legislative assembly from the Yabloko party. 

Given the length of the podcast, we have also divided it into three sections that you can listen to separately.

This week our guest on the podcast is Lev Markovich Shlosberg. Lev Markovich is a Russian politician, a civil society and human rights activist, and a journalist. He is chair of Yabloko’s Pskov regional branch, a member of Yabloko’s federal political committee and a deputy of Pskov regional legislative assembly from the Yabloko party. 

Given the length of the podcast, we have also divided it into three sections that you can listen to separately.

Part One: Gorbachev’s Perestroika. Lev Shlosberg’s early years and the beginnings of public politics under Gorbachev.

This week our guest on the podcast is Lev Markovich

Sergei

Simon

Simon Cosgrove adds: If you want to listen to this podcast on the podcasts.com website and it doesn’t seem to play, please download by clicking on the three dots to the right. A summary of some of the week’s events in Russia relevant to human rights can be found on our website here.

The questions we discuss in the podcast include: When and why Timur Georgievich became a human rights defender; when NGO TV was set up and why; successes and difficulties; the impact of the law on foreign agents; Volgograd as a region in terms of human rights; cooperation with the authorities; future change for better or worse; Navalny’s return; what’s next for human rights organisations in Russia; what lies ahead for Russian civil society in the coming years.

The podcast is in the Russian language. You can listen to the podcast here on Podcasts.com and also on Rights in Russia (https://www.rightsinrussia.org/podcast-6), SoundCloud,  Spotify  and  iTunes. The music, from Stravinsky’s Elegy for Solo Viola, is performed for us by Karolina Herrera.

Sergei Nikitin writes on Facebook: Timur Kobaliya was one of the founders of the Youth Advice and Training Centre in 2010 which is when he began working on human rights issues. In 2013 the centre was labelled a “foreign agent”. As Timur told us, the formal impetus for this was the NGO’s participation in the Georgian-Russian forum, which the human rights defender heads. The actions of the Russian authorities, including the fines levied against the Centre, prompted Timur and his colleagues to appeal to the ECtHR. The closure of the Centre prompted Timur to set up two organisations: the Volgograd Human Rights Council and the Internet Channel for NGOs (NGO TV). Timur runs the television channel with a staff of six and, understandably, the authorities could not but give it their attention. The channel’s presenter, journalist Aleksandr Batmanov, was sentenced in October 2017 to two years and one month in a maximum-security penal colony after being found guilty of stealing Kolbasa [like a German sausage] from a supermarket. The European Federation of Journalists added Aleksandr Batmanov to its list of journalists prosecuted for their professional activities. Although the mission of NGO TV Russia is to promote the activities of non-profit organisations and civic associations, activists and youth, the local authorities are stubborn in their unwillingness to cooperate with such groups, refusing to see them as allies. The picture is familiar, and not only for Volgograd. Simon Cosgrove and I had an interesting conversation with Timur, and we invite you to listen to this recording.

Simon Cosgrove adds: If you want to listen to this podcast on the podcasts.com website and it doesn’t seem to play, please download by clicking on the three dots to the right. A summary of some of the week’s events in Russia relevant to human rights can be found on our website here.

This week our guest on the podcast is the Russian civil society activist Aleksei Andreevich Minyailo. Aleksei Minyailo’s many roles include those of entrepreneur, election observer and philanthropist. He has also been a trainer of election observers – a role he played in Crimea in 2014 when he created a network of independent observers for the referendum. Aleksei Minyailo was also involved in the 2019 Moscow City Duma elections when he was part of Liubov Sobol’s election team. Together with Sobol, he went on hunger strike in protest at the authorities’ refusal to allow her to stand in the elections. On 2 August 2019 he was arrested on charges of inciting riots on 27 July 2019. After two months in pre-trial detention, the charges against him were dropped and he was released.

The podcast is in the Russian language. You can also listen to the podcast on Rights in Russia, SoundCloud,  Spotify  and  iTunes. The music, from Stravinsky’s Elegy for Solo Viola, is performed for us by Karolina Herrera.

Sergei Nikitin writes on Facebook: “You started writing a book in prison, thought up two training programmes and wrote letters to people in prison. How is it possible that people on the outside were discouraged while you, who were in prison, tried to cheer them up? What helps you to be free a person in any circumstances?” Today we tried to get answers to these and many other questions. The hero of today’s podcast is a man who makes the world a better place. In the past he managed to do this when working and volunteering in elections. He also did this when he worked help young people who who have been in orphanages to adapt to the difficult business of life outside. A defendant in the so-called Moscow case, he even made the world a better place when he was behind bars, cheering others in his letters from prison. Aleksei Minyailo was was released from custody in the courtroom when charges against him under Article 212(2) of the Criminal Code were dropped. Today, Aleksei Minyailo is making the world a better place by helping all those who have taken to the streets and squares of Russian cities to protest. He, along with more than a hundred volunteers, staffs a hotline listening to callers who are in difficulty, reassuring them, telling them what to do. Aleksei told us that the state terrorism we are seeing now makes him say to those serving in the Federal Guard Agency, the FSB or other such organisations: “Come to your senses and get out as quickly as possible. Run away from there, because this gang will not be in power forever and you will have to answer for what is being done.”

The questions we discuss with Aleksei Minyailo include: How do you primarily see yourself today – entrepreneur, election observer, civic activist or philanthropist? How do you rate the quality of elections in Russia? What success have you had in getting businesses to cooperate with community activists in the field of socialisation of young people who have spent time in children’s homes? How did it happen that the charges against you were dropped when you were prosecuted and remanded in custody for an offence under Article 212 (Part 2) of the Russian Criminal Code as part of the Moscow case? How was it possible that after you were remanded in custody people at liberty were discouraged and you tried to cheer them up from behind bars. How do you see the protests of 23 January 2021 differing from those of August and September 2019? Do you still work with Liubov Sobol? How do you see the prospects for Aleksei Navalny? How do you see the future of human rights in Russia?

Simon Cosgrove adds: If you want to listen to this podcast on the podcasts.com website and it doesn’t seem to play, please download by clicking on the three dots to the right. A summary of some of the week’s events in Russia relevant to human rights can be found on our website here.