Activist Oppression in Russia

My dear friends at Greenpeace have done a good job at alerting the world to the fate of the Arctic 30 who have had their boat seized and are being held for months awaiting trial for crimes they clearly have not committed.  But my dear friend Lucifer (aka Vladimir Sliviak) wants to remind those willing to listen, that for indigenous activists in Russia, things are far worse.  Below is a recent message from him, which i want to share.

Since Western media are not reporting that much anymore on repression against non-governmental groups in Russia (except for the case with jailed Greenpeace activists), i will put some update on this crackdown going on presently. Feel free to send around.

Greenpeace case is getting a lot of coverage in Russia and governmental media broadcasts a lot of bullshit to make sure Russians hate environmental activists of all kinds.

Ugly thing happened in the South of Russia, Krasnodar city, close to the site of 2014 Winter Olympic Games just a few days ago. Local police together with FSB (exKGB) tried to catch environmental activist Rudomakha. They came to the office of the local political party threatening to storm it because they thought an activist was inside. But he left earlier. Police gave no explanation, but local people think it is because of the Olympics. Rudomakha spent a lot of time criticizing the destruction of local nature related to Olympics preparations. Fortunately, the activist has still not been arrested.

The case is not getting much coverage presently – situation with environmental group “Muravievsky park” in the Far East, charged on the basis of “foreign agent” law last summer.  Just to remind you – “foreign agent” law is targeting Russian activists who get money from foreign sources and practicing “political activities”.  Actually, the group in the Far East is very far from any political activities; they were just protecting cranes. Group went to the court last week, to prove that they are not “foreign agents”. And they failed.  Judge said, once this group collected signatures under petition to local governor (about protection of local nature after big fires) – this is political activity and they are “foreign agents”.

Local prosecutor said something similar to Ecodefense in Kaliningrad – we should not interfere with the work of government of any level, we should not make petitions or influence decision makers in any way. Otherwise, it will be treated as “political activities” with fines/closure, etc. (read the testimony below).

Actually, getting such compliment from Russian authorities is nice, defenitely makes us proud, but we do not want to leave the party yet. Since we were warned, we did a couple of “interferences” and have been lucky so far, getting no serious punishment. Our main “interference” thing is still alive:

We await our urgent case over “foreign agent” law in Russia to be considered by the European Court on Human Rights in 2013. Last winter Ecodefense and 10 human rights groups applied to the ECHR, starting procedure against Russian government over this law. We asked European Court to order Russian government to reverse the law because it violates the Convention on Human Rights. I attach here our latest testimony sent to the ECHR, giving some explanation about the threat. (this is quick translation, a little shorter than original testimony in Russian).

best,

Vladimir Slivyak

Ecodefense

*

Testimony for the  European Court on Human Rights

Case 9988/13

from Ecodefense, Russia

July 19, 2013

In April 2013, our organization was checked by governmental prosecutors who requested a large number of official documents putting unrealistic deadlines. We were informed at 6 pm of April 25 that we should bring documents to the prosecutor by 11 am of April 26. We could not follow this order because for some documents we need several days to request and obtain it from the bank and registration chamber…

Checking of our organization resulted in official warning – local prosecutor declared that political activity is mentioned in our statute and warned that we should not violate the law on non-commercial organizations. Prosecutor also told us that we should not interact with governments of any level. Otherwise, it will be identified as “political activity” and our organization will be held responsible as “foreign agent”.

From our point of view, we are not involved in political activity – we do not take part in elections or any other activity aimed at political power. Also, we are not involved in any effort of other people or organizations aimed to obtain political power. Our organization was distanced from political activities since it was established in 1989…

Our goals in the area of environmental protection cannot be achieved without interaction with governments of various levels. At the same time, both – our strong criticism over policies of Russian government and specific political situation in Russia – are reasons which make it almost impossible to obtain funds from Russian sources. That brings us to unpleasant choice – register as “foreign agent” or close down.

This is unacceptable for us to be registered as “foreign agent”. We are not “agents” for any foreign person, organization or government. We make decisions by ourselves only, and do not take into account interests of any third party.

Continuation of our activities leads us to giant fines under “foreign agents” law and also to shut down because we will not be able to pay such fines.

————end

[Edited by Judy Youngquest]

Monsanto vs Occupy vs Iraq Protests

I think there are three principal classes of what i call catastrophic risk technologies:  nuclear, genetic modification, nanotechnology.  In each of these three cases the technopiles and capitalists are mostly winning, though we are pushing back in nuclear.  In each of these three cases, relatively accessible mistakes can have global detrimental impacts.

we are what we eat

As of this writing there are 395 protests worldwide scheduled for this May 25th (this coming Saturday) against Monsanto for its work on genetically modified organisms.   Of these, 230 are in the US, which seems appropriate given Monsanto is a US creation.  Fortunately, i will be able to go to the protest in Washington DC.  [Which in this case is especially aptly called Death City]. Stay tuned for pictures of this protest.

395 is a lot of simultaneous protests.    Let’s look at some of the other big international protests in comparison.  This is about 1/3 the size of the Occupy movement at it’s height (which wikipedia claims were in 951 cities in 82 counties on the 15th of October 2011).  It is about 1/8th the size (in terms of number of locations) of the world-wide protests against the Iraq War in the lead up to the unlawful US invasion (which wikipedia estimates at over 3000 locations and over 36 million people between Jan 3 and April 12 2003).  The Iraq War protests were in a greater number of cities in the US, and possibly a bit smaller in number of participants than the mass protests against the Vietnam War in the US, which started well after the conflict began.

There are already 65 more locations than this poster indicates

But there is something very different happening here.  Occupy had a huge agenda.   Most of the Iraq War protests took place in Europe which was keenly aware of the deceptions of the Bush administration about the invasion.  These Monsanto protests are targeted at a single corporation, which is in most of the protest countries operating legally.

There is another difference, which is that there is no real spark for these coordinated action.  There is no war looming, there is no financial crisis sharpening the inequities between rich and poor.  And the demands of the Monsanto protest are highly accessible:

• Boycott Monsanto owned companies
• Label GMOs
• Repeal US “Monsanto Protection Act”
• More research on health effects of GMOs
• Holding Monsanto and supporting politicians accountable thru direct communication

Clearly missing from this list is a ban on further GMO product releases until the research on health effects is completed.  India and other countries have banned sale or cultivation.    Hungary went so far as to burn 1000 acres of GMO corn and make planting or selling GMO crops a felony.  Unwilling to wait for often slow government action, activists around the world are destroying GMO crops themselves; typically the test beds.  And they risking imprisonment to do this.

When i dig into who is organizing this March Against Monsanto, it appears to be tiny groups including:

•  The Anti-Media,
• Activists’ Free Press  
• A Revolt – Digital Anarchy.

These groups are so small, that Anti-Media has only 3 comments on their March announcement.  Activist Free Press appears to be a one person operation.  A-revolt is of slightly indeterminate size, but it could be just a few handful of people.

From event organizer a-revolt

I was asked at lunch today what the spark for this global protest movement was and a couple people thought it was the passage of the Monsanto Protection Act.  The more i read about this legislation the more especially vexing it is. So much so that the national outcry has been loud enough to to spark the first congress person calling for provisions of the bill to be removed.

There is a long fight ahead to stop Monsanto, but it seems to have powerful memetic legs and global significance.

The author of this post, Paxus Calta, works for Southern Exposure Seed Exchange (SESE) in central Virginia.  SESE is part of the ASGATA lawsuit against Monsanto to block them from suing farmers who have been contaminated by GMO seeds.