Human Rights in Russia week-ending 4 September 2020 - with Pavel Chikov

Our guest this week is Pavel Chikov. Pavel is a well-known lawyer, human rights activist and public figure who is head of Agora International Human Rights Group. He lives in Kazan. During the podcast we discuss strategic issues of court practice and what distinguishes successful court practice from unsuccessful; Agora's priorities in litigation; the degree of independence of Russian courts; the regulatory framework for NGOs in Russia and the impact of the law on "foreign agents"; the recent constitutional changes; the role of the European Court of Human Rights in Russia; the attractiveness of working in the field of human rights for young lawyers; events in Khabarovsk and Belarus; and the future of human rights in Russia. Sergei Nikitin writes: Everyone knows Chikov. Well, or almost everybody. So that even more people get to know him better, Simon Cosgrove and I talked to Pavel. We had a very interesting conversation. Pavel Chikov talked about what success in the world of lawyering is and about the cases on which Agora's lawyers are working. We discussed a great deal apart from legal issues: about the fact that human rights vocabulary is not very clear to ordinary citizens, about how almost a thousand cases are handled by Apology of Protest, a specialised group set up by Agora, about Agora’s work protecting activists, bloggers, journalists and NGOs. In 2015 the Agora Interregional Association of Human Rights Organizations, which had existed since 2005, was transformed into the Agora International Human Rights Group, with Pavel Chikov at its head. Listen to our conversation, I’m sure you’ll find it very interesting. The podcast is in Russian. You can also listen to this podcast on Podcasts.com (www.podcasts.com/simon-sergei-0b5d072c0), Spotify (open.spotify.com/show/7HdmvhzC2P6VQS8ijICNHZ) and Itunes (podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/simo...ei/id1495261418). The music is from the Elegy for Solo Viola by Stravinsky, performed by Karolina Herrera.