[Russian] LGBT Group First to Face Fine Under New Law

LGBT Group First to Face Fine Under New Law

By Sergey Chernov

The St. Petersburg Times

Published: June 20, 2013 (Issue # 1764)

Sergey Chernov / SPT Side by Side organizer Gulya Sultanova (left) with a placard reading ‘Don’t look for enemies where there are none!”.

The Side by Side (Bok o Bok) LGBT rights film festival last week became St. Petersburg’s first non-governmental organization (NGO) to be fined a hefty sum for not registering as a “foreign agent” in the Kremlin’s ongoing crackdown on NGOs.

The festival will have to pay 500,000 rubles ($15,620) under the highly controversial 2012 law demanding that NGOs “involved in political activities” and “receiving funds or other property from foreign sources” register as “foreign agents.”

The LGBT rights organization Vykhod (Coming Out), the second NGO on trial in the city, was also fined 500,000 rubles on Wednesday, June 19.

The prosecution claimed that Side by Side’s activities were political because the organization campaigned against a local bill banning “propaganda of sodomy, lesbianism, bisexuality and transgenderism to minors” and published a pamphlet called “The Worldwide LGBT Movement: Local Practices to Global Politics.”

According to the law, an NGO is considered to be involved in political activities if it participates “in organizing and implementing political actions aimed at influencing the decision-making by state bodies intended for the change of state policy pursued by them, as well as in the shaping of public opinion for the aforementioned purposes.”

The defense — lawyers Dmitry Bartenev and Sergei Golubok — argued that the campaign “Let’s Stop the Homophobic Bill Together” was held between November 2011 and March 2012, months before November 21, 2012, when the law came into effect, while the pamphlet was published in October 2012. The Russian Constitution states that a law introducing or aggravating liability cannot be applied retroactively.

Side by Side’s trial, which opened on May 24, went on hold when the court agreed with the defense’s arguments and asked the prosecutors to provide the missing documentation stating the grounds of the probe into the activities of the NGO — which was part of mass inspections of hundreds of NGOs across Russia in March and April by teams of prosecutors, tax inspectors, fire marshals and other government agencies.

At the second hearing, the prosecution presented a report stating that Side by Side’s logo depicting two stick figures hugging each other against the background of a rainbow was not registered as grounds for the inspection. According to the defense, in reality mass inspections across Russia were conducted upon the General Prosecutor’s orders and were not legitimate, because by law the prosecutors had no right to launch investigations into NGOs.

The defense also motioned that the court should send an inquiry to the Constitutional Court as to whether the vaguely stated “foreign agents” law complies with the constitution, but this motion was dismissed.

In the end of a four-hour hearing on Thursday, June 6, Judge Oleg Kamaldinov took a ten-minute pause for consideration before pronouncing the organization guilty. Side by Side said it would appeal the ruling.

“This trial showed that the law’s actual purpose is to fight against dissent, for it was exactly what the organization does – defending the rights of the LGBT community through cultural events – that the prosecutors did not like and that was branded ‘political’ activities,” the NGO said in a statement.

Festival organizer Gulya Sultanova said she saw the legal action taken against two LGBT rights organizations in St. Petersburg as a “political order.”

“LGBT [organizations] are the most undesirable for the St. Petersburg political establishment led by [Governor Georgy] Poltavchenko, because we are active and irritate St. Petersburg’s current authorities a lot, and of course they did not fail to take advantage of this lucky chance. This is an attempt to drive us out of the public sphere, to cause us problems, so that we are silenced and end our work,” Sultanova told The St. Petersburg Times.

Amnesty International described the ruling as “further evidence of the Russian government’s determination to curtail the freedom of association and free speech in the country” in a statement on the day of the trial.

Meanwhile, Vykhod said that its case also did not receive fair treatment, with its defense’s motions being systematically denied, the judge’s sympathies apparently being on the side of the prosecution.

“The case is being hastily made, while the prosecutor’s office presents far-fetched evidence that is taken by the court as truth without using reasonable doubt, in order to brand the organization [as a “foreign agent”] as quickly as possible,” Vykhod’s press officer OIga Lenkova said in a statement on Tuesday, June 11, after the second hearing.

“We do not believe that we conduct any political activities, and will not enter the register. It is absurd to see the protection of the rights of Russian citizens as activities in the interest of a foreign state.”

The “foreign agents” law was brought before the State Duma in June 2012, after mass protests over the revelation of irregularities during the State Duma and presidential elections that brought their legitimacy into question.

NGOs like the Golos voters’ rights association, the country’s biggest independent elections watchdog — which was the first organization to be fined in Moscow in April and threatened last month by the Ministry of Justice with closure if it does not register as a “foreign agent” – were instrumental in exposing the scale of electoral fraud.

The NGOs have refused to register as “foreign agents,” saying it would stigmatize them as allegedly acting in the interests of foreign governments.