Today we want to talk about Svetlana Arshavskaya, our friend and colleague from ANO “Everyone's Right”, Orenburg, russia.
Recently, footage of the interrogation of Svetlana by a russian police investigator appeared on the Internet.
We, her friends and colleagues, can confidently assert that before recording this conversation, Svetlana was under enormous psychological pressure, her forced answers can be taken out of context and interpreted in the interests of the investigation.
A little about Svetlana:
She is a courageous human rights activist who has dedicated her life to helping drug addicts and ex-prisoners in russia. Svetlana is the leader of the respected human rights organization “Everyone's Right”, which has been fighting for the rights of vulnerable categories of the population for many years and is working intensively to raise awareness of the situation of these people.
In 2021, the “Right of Everyone” was headed by Aidana Fedosik (now - head of UnMode). On November 15, 2021, police and FSB officers broke into the house where Aidana lived alone with minor children and conducted a thorough search. The official reason is drugs, but as in the case of Svetlana, this is just an excuse to get access to information about the work of the organizations that Aidana headed. Thanks to the work of our lawyers and partners, a wave of protest rose in the media against the willfulness of the FSB. However, the threat to Aidana's security and freedom left her no choice and caused her family to be evacuated from russia in October 2021.
The fact that the activities of the organization "Right of Everyone", as well as the work of Svetlana, interested law enforcement agencies, in russia can be called recognition of the quality and volume of the work done. The fact that they are now trying to reduce Sveta's anti-war position and her many years of experience to several articles of the administrative and criminal codes is the harsh reality of all human rights activists in russia. This is not an isolated case: human rights activists in russia are not just subjected to repression, they are now being hunted down.
With this post, we want to support Sveta, our colleague and friend. We continue to keep in touch with her and are involved to the extent possible in the development of events on the spot.
We stand in solidarity with Svetlana and all other human rights activists from russia who risk their own safety to fight for the rights of the most vulnerable categories of people and support Ukrainian citizens in need.
Our work is essential if we are to see any progress in ending the human rights violations that occur in russia every day. We understand that our efforts now do not lead to results and evil is not defeated. But we must and can not remain silent in support of representatives of russian civil society and not leave them face to face with the system.