[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 103 (Monday, June 14, 2021)]
[House]
[Pages H2726-H2728]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  REAFFIRMING TRANSATLANTIC SOLIDARITY

  (Ms. KAPTUR asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, as co-chair of the bipartisan 
Congressional Ukraine Caucus, I rise to reaffirm transatlantic 
solidarity in advance of President Biden's meeting with Russian 
dictator Vladimir Putin.
  I am so thankful to President Biden, who is personally committed to 
liberty in Ukraine. I was proud to travel with him and Senator McCain 
to Ukraine in 2015, for President Poroshenko's inauguration.
  As President Biden knows well, Vladimir Putin is an enemy of liberty. 
Ukraine faces its seventh year of brutal Russian aggression that has 
led to over 14,000 deaths. Putin's thugs gunned down liberty defenders 
like Boris Nemtsov and so many more freedom lovers.
  Madam Speaker, I include in the Record Amnesty International's deeply 
troubling human rights report on Russia.

                                 Russia

       Russian Federation
       Head of state: Vladimir Putin
       Head of government: Mikhail Mishustin (replaced Dmitry 
     Medvedev in January)
       The COVID-19 pandemic exposed chronic under-resourcing in 
     health care. The authorities used the pandemic as a pretext 
     to continue the crackdown on all dissent, including through 
     amendments to a vaguely worded law on ``fake news'' and 
     tightening restrictions on public gatherings. Peaceful 
     protesters, human rights defenders and civic and political 
     activists faced arrest and prosecution. Persecution of 
     Jehovah's Witnesses intensified. Torture remained endemic, as 
     did near total impunity for perpetrators. The right to a fair 
     trial was routinely violated while legal amendments resulted 
     in a further reduction in judicial independence. Reports of 
     domestic violence rose sharply during COVID-19 lockdown 
     measures, although the draft law on domestic violence 
     remained stalled in Parliament. LGBTI people continued to 
     face discrimination and persecution. Thousands of labour 
     migrants lost their jobs during the pandemic but were unable 
     to leave because of border closures. Evidence emerged to 
     corroborate allegations of war crimes by Russian forces in 
     Syria.


                               BACKGROUND

       The economic downturn, underpinned by falling oil prices, 
     dwindling investment and foreign sanctions, and exacerbated 
     by the COVID-19 pandemic, led to a further impoverishment of 
     a growing proportion of the population. Discontent widened, 
     with a slow but steady increase in protests. The government 
     continually faced, and ignored, mounting allegations of 
     corruption at all levels. Measures announced by President 
     Vladimir Putin and his government, like extended fully paid 
     leave for all workers in response to COVID-19, failed to 
     address people's broader concerns.

[[Page H2727]]

       The authorities introduced multiple amendments to the 
     Constitution, with the apparent purpose of removing legal 
     restrictions on President Putin's participation in future 
     presidential elections.
       Russia maintained a strong influence on its immediate 
     neighbours, and its occupation of Crimea and other 
     territories continued.


                            right to health

       The COVID-19 pandemic placed further strain on the health 
     care system, exposing chronic under-resourcing. A shortage of 
     hospital beds, key protective and medical equipment and 
     medications, together with the delayed wages of health 
     workers, were frequently reported across the country. 
     Official and independent numbers on infection and mortality 
     rates varied greatly, indicating government under-reporting.
     Health workers
       Whistle-blowers from among health workers and other groups 
     faced reprisals, including disciplinary measures and 
     prosecution for ``fake news''.
       Doctor Tatyana Revva was arbitrarily reprimanded and 
     threatened with dismissal after she repeatedly complained 
     about the shortage and inadequacy of protective equipment. 
     Police considered and dismissed ``fake news'' allegations 
     against her following a complaint from the hospital's head 
     doctor.
     Prison conditions
       Health care and sanitary provisions in penitentiary 
     institutions remained inadequate and further exacerbated by 
     the pandemic. Although the authorities implemented 
     restrictive and additional sanitary measures, they did not 
     take measures to reduce the prison population. Official 
     COVID-19 figures in custody were considered unreliable by 
     independent monitors.


                          freedom of assembly

       Freedom of peaceful assembly remained constrained with 
     further restrictions introduced in December. The rules 
     relating to public assemblies and single-person pickets were 
     further restricted in response to the pandemic, and some 
     regions banned them outright. Public protests were typically 
     small but regular, despite reprisals. There was a sharp 
     increase in the numbers of single picketers arrested and 
     prosecuted.
       On 15 July, over a hundred peaceful protesters against 
     constitutional changes were arbitrarily arrested and at least 
     three severely beaten by the police in Moscow. Dozens were 
     heavily fined or detained for five to 14 days.
       The 9 July arrest of Sergey Furgal, who in 2018 had 
     defeated the pro-Kremlin candidate to be elected Governor in 
     the Far East Khabarovsk Region, prompted weekly peaceful mass 
     protests in Khabarovsk as well as solidarity protests across 
     Russia. Unusually, tens of thousands were allowed to march 
     repeatedly in Khabarovsk before police made the first arrests 
     on 18 July. On 10 October, police dispersed the protest for 
     the first time, arresting at least 25 people, with at least 
     five later sentenced to several days in detention. The 
     protests in Khabarovsk were continuing at year's end.
       In December, peaceful protester Konstantin Kotov was 
     released following his imprisonment in 2019 for ``repeated 
     violation'' of regulations on public assemblies. In January, 
     the Constitutional Court had ordered a review of his case, 
     and in April, the Moscow City Court reduced his sentence from 
     four years to 18 months. Others prosecuted for the same 
     offence included political activist Yulia Galyamina, who was 
     given a two-year conditional sentence in December, activist 
     Vyacheslav Egorov standing trial in Kolomna, and protester 
     Aleksandr Prikhodko from Khabarovsk. In December, Aleksandr 
     Prikhodko's case was dropped.
       While police routinely used excessive and unnecessary force 
     against protesters, they also allowed anti-protester violence 
     by other groups. In Kushtau, Bashkiria, peaceful 
     environmental activists who opposed a local mining project 
     were repeatedly assaulted, with impunity, by private security 
     staff, occasionally operating alongside police. Late on 9 
     August, around 30 private security guards and around 100 
     masked men attacked a camp of 10 environmental activists. 
     Police were called but did not intervene. This triggered 
     further local protests which forced the closure of the mining 
     project in late August.


                         FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION

       Restrictions on freedom of expression continued. On 1 
     April, amendments to the so-called ``fake news'' law, first 
     passed in 2019, criminalized dissemination of ``knowingly 
     false information about circumstances posing a threat to the 
     lives and security of citizens and/or about the government's 
     actions to protect the population.'' Individuals face up to 
     five years' imprisonment if dissemination of information 
     leads to bodily harm or death, with hefty fines for the 
     media. Hundreds of people were fined under administrative 
     proceedings, and at least 37 faced criminal proceedings under 
     this law, many of them critical civil activists, journalists 
     or bloggers. At least five media outlets were prosecuted. The 
     newspaper Novaya Gazeta and its chief editor were fined 
     twice, in August and September, for publications about COVID-
     19 and ordered to delete respective articles online.
     Journalists
       Harassment, prosecution and physical attacks against 
     journalists continued. On 30 June, police in Saint Petersburg 
     assaulted reporter David Frenkel at a polling station and 
     broke his arm. On 15 October, a journalist from Khabarovsk, 
     Sergei Plotnikov, was abducted by masked men, driven to the 
     woods, beaten and subjected to a mock execution. He reported 
     the incident to the police once released but by year's end, 
     he had not been informed about any investigation.
       A journalist from Nizhnii Novgorod, Irina Slavina, faced 
     routine harassment by the authorities. On 1 October, her home 
     was raided and searched, and police summoned her as a witness 
     in a criminal case against a local activist under the 
     ``undesirable organizations'' law. On 2 October, she died 
     after self-immolating in protest in front of the regional 
     police headquarters.
       On 6 July, a military court in Pskov convicted journalist 
     Svetlana Prokopieva of ``public justification of terrorism'' 
     and fined her RUB500,000 (US$6,300) for her public comments 
     on repressive policies that may have motivated a 17-year-old 
     to blow himself up near the Federal Security Service building 
     in Arkhangelsk.
     Internet
       Censorship of the internet continued. In June, the European 
     Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in Vladimir Kharitonov v. 
     Russia and three other cases ruled that internet-blocking 
     measures were ``excessive and arbitrary'' and violated the 
     right to impart and receive information. A court in Moscow 
     fined Google RUBl.5 million (US$18,899) in August and RUB3 
     million (US$40,580) in December for its search engine listing 
     ``dangerous content'' banned by Russian authorities. In 
     December, President Putin signed a law introducing sanctions 
     on foreign internet platforms for blocking Russian media 
     content. Another law passed in December introduced 
     imprisonment for libel committed via the internet.
     Repression of dissent
       Opposition activists and other dissenting voices faced 
     severe reprisals. As part of the politically motivated 
     criminal case against opposition leader Alexei Navalny's 
     AntiCorruption Fund, 126 bank accounts belonging to his 
     associates were frozen in January, followed by criminal and 
     civil libel cases against Alexei Navalny and others. On 20 
     August, Alexei Navalny was taken ill on a flight from Tomsk. 
     He was urgently hospitalized, and later flown to Germany 
     where he was diagnosed with poisoning by a military-grade 
     nerve agent. The Russian authorities failed to investigate 
     the poisoning.
       Siberian shaman Aleksandr Gabyshev, who had vowed to 
     ``purge'' President Putin from the Kremlin, was on 12 May 
     confined to a psychiatric hospital after he refused to be 
     tested for COVID-19. He was discharged on 22 July following 
     criticism in Russia and abroad.
       In June, political blogger Nikolay Platoshkin was placed 
     under house arrest on criminal charges of ``calls to mass 
     disturbances'' and dissemination of ``knowingly false 
     information'' for planning a peaceful protest against 
     constitutional amendments.


                         human rights defenders

       Harassment, prosecution, and physical attacks against human 
     rights defenders remained commonplace.
       Activists Alexandra Koroleva, in Kaliningrad, and Semyon 
     Simonov, in Sochi, were charged and faced possible 
     imprisonment for non-payment of arbitrary and heavy fines by 
     their respective NGOs.
       Journalist Elena Milashina and lawyer Marina Dubrovina were 
     assaulted by a mob in a hotel in Grozny, Chechyna, on 6 
     February. A formal investigation started in March but was 
     manifestly ineffective. Meanwhile, Chechen head Ramzan 
     Kadyrov issued thinly veiled death threats against Elena 
     Milashina, with impunity.
       Lawyer Mikhail Benyash's appeal against his criminal 
     conviction--which could lead to disbarment--started in 
     October and was still ongoing at year's end.


                         freedom of association

       Laws on ``foreign agents'' and ``undesirable 
     organizations'' were actively used to smear independent NGOs, 
     deprive them of funding and severely penalize their members. 
     In December, further draconian legislative changes were 
     signed into law, including to extend the ``foreign agents'' 
     provisions to NGOs staff, unregistered groups and 
     individuals.
       In April, the education NGO Projectoria was forced to 
     register as a ``foreign agent'' to avoid fines while its 
     foreign donor, Project Harmony, was declared ``undesirable''.
       In October, activist Yana Antonova from Krasnodar was 
     sentenced to 240 hours of forced labour for association with 
     an ``undesirable organization'', re-posting Open Russia-
     branded materials online and taking part in single person 
     pickets. She was subsequently fined again under new 
     administration proceedings.


                     freedom of religion and belief

       The prosecution of Jehovah's Witnesses under ``extremism'' 
     charges escalated, including in occupied Crimea, with a 
     growing number of convictions, and longer sentences. At 
     year's end, 362 people were under investigation or standing 
     trial, 39 had been convicted and six were imprisoned. Artem 
     Gerasimov, for example, was sentenced on appeal in June to 
     six years' imprisonment and a fine of RUB400,000 (US$5,144) 
     by the de facto Supreme Court of Crimea.


                    torture and other ill-treatment

       Torture and other ill-treatment remained pervasive, and the 
     number of perpetrators convicted was negligible. Prosecutions 
     were typically for ``abuse of authority'' and resulted in 
     lenient sentences.

[[Page H2728]]

       Twelve former prison officers from Yaroslavil colony were 
     sentenced to up to four years and three months' imprisonment 
     after a leaked video showed an inmate being beaten in 2017. 
     Six of them were immediately released on account of time 
     already spent in detention. The former head and deputy head 
     of the colony were acquitted.


                             unfair trials

       Violations of the right to a fair trial remained common. 
     Detainees were denied meetings with their lawyers and a 
     number of trials continued to be closed to the public, with 
     the COVID-19 pandemic being often abusively used as a 
     justification.
       In February and June respectively, seven young men from 
     Penza, and two from Saint Petersburg, received sentences of 
     up to 18 years' imprisonment under trumped-up terrorism 
     charges over their purported involvement with a non-existent 
     organization called ``Network''. Numerous allegations of 
     torture and other ill-treatment, and of fabrication of 
     evidence, were ignored.
       Constitutional and legislative amendments further eroded 
     the right to a fair trial, including by giving the President 
     power to nominate the judges of the Constitutional and 
     Supreme Courts, and initiate the appointment of all federal 
     judges and dismissal of senior federal judges.
     Counter-terrorism
       Counterterrorism legislation was widely abused, often to 
     target dissent.
       Journalist Abdulmumin Gadzhiev, from Dagestan, remained in 
     custody under fabricated charges of financing terrorism and 
     participation in terrorist and extremist organizations. His 
     trial started in November.
       In occupied Crimea, allegations of membership of the 
     Islamist organization Hizb-ut-Tahrir (labelled as a 
     ``terrorist'' movement by Russia in 2003) were widely used to 
     imprison ethnic Crimean Tatars. In June, Crimean human rights 
     defender Emir-Usein Kuku lost the appeal against his 12-year 
     prison sentence. In September, another Crimean human rights 
     defender, Server Mustafayev, was sentenced to 14 years in 
     prison.
       In September, 19 men from Ufa, Bashkira, convicted for 
     alleged Hiz-ut-Tahrir membership and sentenced to between 10 
     and 24 years, lost their appeal, with one defendant's 
     sentence reduced by a year.


                    violence against women and girls

       Proposals to introduce legislation on domestic violence 
     remained stalled in Parliament, while NGOs reported a sharp 
     increase in domestic violence following COVID-19 lockdown 
     measures.
       In June, the ECtHR held a Polshina v. Russia that 
     deficiencies in the legal system related to domestic violence 
     violated the prohibitions of torture and discrimination. The 
     Court underlined Russia's consistent failure to investigate 
     abuse, and years-long tolerance of ``a climate which was 
     conducive to domestic violence''.


  rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (lgbti) 
                                 people

       LGBTI people continued to face discrimination and 
     persecution. Constitutional amendments redefined marriage as 
     a ``union between a man and woman'', reinforcing existing 
     limitations on same-sex couples.
       LGBTI rights activist Yulia Tsvetkova was fined RUB75,000 
     (US$1,014) for posting online her drawings in support of 
     same-sex couples and faced other penalities, including 
     ongoing presecution for pornography relating to her body 
     positive drawings featuring female genitalia.


                            migrants' rights

       Over a third of foreign labour migrants reported having 
     lost work owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, and thousands were 
     stranded in Russia due to related border closures. In April, 
     a presidential decree eased work permit and residency rules 
     for migrants and refugees, and temporarily suspended forcible 
     returns of foreign and stateless individuals. Some regional 
     authorities ceased temporary detention of migrants, although 
     new decisions on forcible returns were also reported.


                            unlawful attacks

       Evidence including witness statements, videos, photographs 
     and satellite imagery of seven air strikes against medical 
     facilities and schools by Russian forces, and four by Syrian 
     or Russian forces, between May 2019 and February 2020 in 
     Syria, corroborated allegations of serious violations of 
     international humanitarian law amounting to war crimes.

  Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, a successful meeting with Putin can only 
be accomplished proceeding from a position of strength.
  While I am deeply concerned the administration waived Nord Stream 2 
sanctions, I am pleased President Biden invited President Zelensky to a 
White House visit. I am also grateful the administration announced $150 
million in security assistance to Ukraine.
  This week, President Biden has an opportunity to pivot from the Trump 
administration's disastrous legacy that left the transatlantic 
relationship in tatters. The Congress and our caucus stand ready to 
work with the administration to counter Russian aggression by 
increasing Ukraine's security and democracy assistance.
  Onward liberty. Onward Ukraine.

                          ____________________