MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 30th December, 2021) The criticism of the Russian Supreme Court's verdict on the liquidation of Memorial International (recognized as a foreign agent in Russia), a human rights organization studying political crimes and repression in the Soviet Union, by the Western countries demonstrates their disrespect for the Russian judicial system, Grigory Lukyantsev, the Russian Foreign Ministry's commissioner for human rights, democracy and the rule of law, told Sputnik.
The Tuesday verdict on Memorial International was condemned by the Council of Europe, the United Nations, the United States and some EU nations.
"This is disrespect for our national legal and judicial system, it is independent and we do not exert any pressure on the verdicts. The court made such a decision based on the Russian legislation, this is crucial for us," Lukyantsev said.
The request to close Memorial International was submitted to the Supreme Court last month on charges of violating Russia's foreign agents law.
According to prosecutors, International Memorial distorts the memory of the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945 and "creates a false image of the USSR as a terrorist state." The organization is also accused of failing to label its materials as those produced by a foreign agent.
The NGO's defense team, for its part, requested that they not be shut down outright, noting that the group had already paid relevant fines and adapted its activities to the law on "foreign agents" by labeling its publications with relevant warnings.
On Wednesday, a Moscow court also liquidated the Memorial Human Rights Center, an affiliate group charged with justifying terrorism in its publications, along with allegedly violating the "foreign agents" law by repeatedly failing to mark its publications with a relevant warning.�
