Evidently, there will be no hearing at the Petrozavodsk City Court today. Dmitriev’s attorney Victor Anufriev made the journey from Moscow to the Karelian capital and arrived at the courthouse at 10 am. There he waited outside closed doors until 11 am when he learned that Judge Khomyakova was hearing another case elsewhere in the building.
Continue readingSt Petersburg*
Petersburg Court receives Appeal; third hearing in Petrozavodsk
A recent post on the website of the Petrozavodsk City Court reports that Yury DMITRIEV’s appeal of 21 December has been forwarded to the Third Cassation Court in St Petersburg. The appeal objects to the decisions handed down by the Supreme Court of Karelia on 29 September: Dmitriev’s term of imprisonment was increased almost fourfold from 3 ½ to 13 years in a strict regime penal colony; and the three other charges were returned to the city court to be re-examined a third time.
Continue readingThe Guardian of History
On 22 August, an exhibition opened in the Chamber Theatre («Петербургский интерьерный театр») at 104 Nevsky Prospect in St Petersburg about the historian and rights activist Yury DMITRIEV, the man who investigated one of the most terrible commemorative sites of the Great Terror, the Sandarmokh Clearing in Karelia.
Continue readingHistorians behind bars
On 27 January 2019, Russia laid on a huge military parade to mark the 75th anniversary of the lifting of the Siege of Leningrad, writes Halya Coynash. In a hate campaign, worthy of their Soviet predecessors, Kremlin-loyal media and commentators turned on German journalist, Silke Bigalke, who criticized this “dancing on the bones” of the million Leningrad residents who died during the Siege.
Yet many Russians, including some historians, felt uneasy about holding a military parade rather than a sombre remembrance of the victims. How many other historians preferred not to comment in public cannot be known – the number is likely to be rising.
Continue readingAnatoly Razumov (video)
Their Names Restored project (Russia’s Books of Remembrance), National Library, St Petersburg
