Human Rights in Russia week-ending 23 October 2020 - with Marina Dubrovina, human rights lawyer from Novorossiisk

This week our guest is Marina Alekseevna Dubrovina. Marina Alekseevna is a human rights defender and lawyer from Novorossiisk. For many years Marina Alekseevna has worked with the Migration and Law network, which is part of the Memorial organisation. She has also worked with the Public Verdict Foundation. Marina Alekseevna has defended many individuals in prosecutions in Chechnya, including the human rights defender Oyub Titiev.

The questions we discuss in the podcast include: the Oyub Titiev case and other high profile court cases in Chechnya and elsewhere; the human rights situation in Chechnya, Krasnodar region and Russia in general; the use of torture by law enforcement agencies; the role of the European Court of Human Rights; problems of the judicial and law enforcement systems in today’s Russia; the attack on Marina and the journalist Elena Milashina; the safety of human rights defenders and lawyers, especially in Chechnya; how Marina became a human rights lawyer; and the future of human rights and the rule of law in Russia.

Sergei Nikitin writes on Facebook: I have always admired human rights defenders who live outside the capitals. Marina Dubrovina, who lives in Novorossiisk, is among them. She is a wonderful lawyer who started her career after attending a lecture by Karinna Moskalenko. In the conversation that Simon and I had with Marina last week, Marina talked about about how this lecture “turned her life around.” Marina has been a lawyer with the human rights organisation Migration and Law since 2003, and since 2007 she has been an advokat (barrister), always distinguished by her high professionalism and – I would add – courage. We talked to Marina both about the attack on her in February this year and about an attempt to deprive her of her lawyer’s status. We discuss the Oyub Titiev case and the cases of Nikolai Karpyuk and Stanislav Klych. We recalled the cases of Vitishko and Ghazaryan, Mikhail Savva and Vyacheslav Merekha – all these people were defended by Marina Dubrovina. They and many others have been helped by this outstanding lawyer from Novorossisk.

Simon Cosgrove adds: If you want to listen to this podcast on the podcasts.com website and it doesn’t seem to play, please download by clicking on the three dots to the right. A summary of some of the week’s events in Russia relevant to human rights can be found on our website here. You can also listen to the podcast on Podcasts.com, SoundCloud, Spotify or iTunes. The music, from Stravinsky’s Elegy for Solo Viola, is performed for us by Karolina Herrera.