Only one man, only (perhaps) a couple of months in custody – is this why the Western media is so depressingly uninterested in the remand in custody of St Petersburg opposition politician Maxim Reznik? What about only the first brazen arrest on trumped up charges following Medvedev’s “victory” on 2 March?.

According to the head of the human rights centre “Vyasna” Ales Belyavsky, the monthly protest actions in Belarus in solidarity with political prisoners are producing some positive results. This is in spite of the continuing repressions against opposition figures

Olga Kudrina, 24-year-old activist of the National Bolshevik Party [NBP] which is banned in Russia, received a prison sentence for hanging a banner on the façade of the “Russiya” Hotel reading “Putin, go by yourself!”

Given the near information blackout in Armenia, it is important to post the following appeal from the Helsinki Association of Armenia and the report about arrests, etc

Protest against the persecution of Maxim Reznik has moved from St Petersburg to Moscow. An ongoing one-person picket is to be positioned outside the Prosecutor General’s office

Abdugani Kamaliyev (Tursinov), 49 and married to a Russian national, was expelled from Russia in December 2007. The Russian authorities are now distorting the facts to explain away why they did not comply with a directive from the European Court of Human Rights

The Russian Federation Presidential elections were marked by an ominous precedent – an overtly fabricated criminal investigation against a political opponent. Please sign this appeal

The charges are worryingly absurd and the timing of Maxim Reznik’s arrest – on the eve of a March of those in dissent in St Petersburg – even more disturbing

Not a lot to say about the “elections” yesterday in the Russian Federation. The result was clear weeks ago, the vote-rigging also reported by most of those who did observe the performance. The detentions and violent dispersal of demonstrations must not however be ignored

The renowned human rights defender and former political prisoner has addressed the following open letter to President Putin, the Head of the Russian Federation Central Election Commission V. Churov, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs S. Lavrov.

Irina Kazulina died yesterday, 23 February, of cancer. Her husband, Belarusian political prisoner and former democratic candidate in the Presidential elections, is serving a five and a half year sentence for his opposition activities

Plans to move the monument to victims of repression are unacceptable. "We are convinced that the Solovky Stone, like the Grave of the Unknown Soldier, are sacred places, demanding special respect"

According to the federal body overseeing the media, the author’s suggestion that dark circumstances be changed for a light choice “can be interpreted as a public call for a change to the basis of the constitutional order”

The Russian Ministry for Emergencies has lodged an application with a Moscow court to suspend for 90 days the activities of the Russian Union of Journalists. This it claims is due to infringements of fire safety norms

“Voice of Beslan” is an organization of people who lost their children in the Beslan Tragedy. They are seeking the truth and are now being persecuted and need our help. Please send them your words of support – cf. http://www.khpg.org.ua/en/index.php?id=1200361352

According to Aleksanian’s representative at the European Court of Human Rights, the conditions his terminally ill client are being held in are even worse than in the remand centre

Andrei was arrested during the protest actions by business people on 21 January and has already served a term of administrative arrest, but the authorities have now come up with other charges

Drew Holiner, Vasily Aleksanian’s representative at the European Court of Human Rights reports that his lawyers have not been allowed to see their client. He stresses that this is in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights

May God help us all in this, our shared and difficult cause, to fight for observance of the law, for our right to be free individuals, for the future of our children

According to Adrian White, General Secretary of the International Federation of Journalists “Under the pretence of concern over piracy issues the government is waging a new campaign to silence its media critics”