Political Persecutions in Russia: Portraits of Prisoners

The number of politically motivated cases in Russia has significantly risen over the past five years, reaching a record of 700 cases in 2022, the first year of the war in Ukraine. Today, more than 1,000 people are in jail or prison in Russia for political reasons, according to the human rights media project OVD-Info.But these numbers don’t give the full picture of what happens to those who do not agree with Russian policies. In this episode we will discuss the people who are politically persecuted: their profile, the reasons for their persecution, how the Russian justice system treats them, and how the war in Ukraine has changed political prosecutions.Joining us are lawyer Olga Podoplelova, OVD-Info analyst Dariya Korolenko and OVD-Info's English-language editor Dan Storyev. The projects and stories mentioned in this episode can be found here:OVD-Info’s weekly Dissident DigestLetters Across Borders, OVD-Info’s letter-writing toolOVD-Info’s database of political persecution in RussiaYegor Balazeikin, the 17-year-old imprisoned for six years, featured in the Dissident Digest Vladimir Rumyantsev, an elderly boiler operator sentenced to three years for an anti-war radio broadcast, featured on OVD-InfoLev Skoryakin, kidnapped in Kyrgyzstan, featured in the Dissident DigestSasha Skochilenko in the Dissident DigestInterview with Ilya Yashin