Russia brands Crimea’s “Crimean Solidarity” movement a “foreign agent”

Crimean Solidarity, the rights group that relatives of Crimean detainees built alongside lawyers and activists to defend victims of political repression, has been declared a foreign agent in Russia.

Olha Kuryshko, the Ukrainian president’s permanent representative in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, took up the designation at the International Forum of the Crimea Platform Expert Network.

“This is exactly why Crimea is not just militarized,” she said. “Since 2014 it has been the proving ground where the occupier tests its methods: pressure on the media, occupation law imposed by force, control of the information space, the targeting of children and the young. To Russia, Crimea is a resource to feed its sick ambitions.”

Kuryshko said Russia is holding Crimeans and other Ukrainians as political prisoners on fabricated charges, and she read out some of their names: Iryna Danylovych, Halyna Dovhopola, Asan Akhtemov, Vilen Temeryanov, Abas Burkhamed, Server Mustafaiev, Bohdan Ziza, and Amet Suleimanov.

In Russia, “foreign agent” is a formal legal status the authorities pin on people, news outlets, and civic or commercial groups they decide are taking “foreign support” or acting under “foreign influence.”

Read more: https://mediacenter.org.ua/news