Russia blocks website of group that tracks political arrests

A Russian organisation that tracks political arrests and provides legal aid to detainees said on Saturday that government regulators blocked its website, the latest move in a months-long crackdown on independent media and human rights organizations.

OVD-Info reported that Russia’s internet and communications watchdog, Roskomnadzor, blocked the group’s website. The organisation said in a tweet that it wasn’t formally notified about the decision and doesn’t know the reason for the action beyond that it was ordered by a court outside Moscow on Monday.

The website was unavailable to Russian internet users on Saturday and was listed on the government’s registry of banned web pages. In light of the move, OVD-Info urged supporters to follow its pages on a number of social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Russian social network VK and messaging app Telegram.

In comments to the Interfax news agency, Roskomnadzor said the website was blocked because, according to the court ruling, it was involved in “propaganda of terrorism and extremism” by publishing content aimed at “justifying actions of extremist and terrorist groups”.

The agency said social media platforms have been told to remove the group’s accounts.

OVD-Info co-founder Grigory Okhotin rejected the accusations in an interview with The Associated Press on Saturday.

“Naturally, we are sure that we are not justifying extremism or terrorism,” he said. “Of course, we write about such cases, this is our job, but it is not justifying (extremism or terrorism).”

Okhotin said the ruling to block the website came as a surprise, even though the group knew the prosecutor’s office in Lukhovitsy, a town 120 kilometres southeast of Moscow, had opened an investigation of some kind.

“Our lawyer went there, but they refused to provide documents or to explain anything about the substance of the case, even though they summoned him themselves,” Okhotin said. “We, of course, didn’t know that it would get to court so quickly — which we haven’t been invited to, by the way — and to blocking of the website over accusations of justifying terrorism and extremism.”

OVD-Info gained prominence for its meticulous tracking and counting of arrests at street protests in Russia. Activists first started the practice during mass protests triggered by a 2011 Russian parliamentary election tainted by numerous reports of voter fraud and then formed a group that has continued the work over the years.

The data has been indispensable to news outlets over the years as Russian authorities largely kept quiet or underplayed the scale of mass arrests at protests and demonstrations.

OVD-Info operates as a legal aid group as well, dispatching lawyers to help detained protesters at police stations and in courts. In September, a Sweden-based international human rights organization awarded OVD-Info its Civil Rights Defender of the Year award.

That same month Russian authorities designated the group as a “foreign agent” — a label that comes with excessive government scrutiny and strong pejorative connotations that can discredit recipients. OVD-Info’s founders vowed to continue the organisation’s work despite the designation.

“We will definitely find some form or another to keep the public informed,” he said.