Index on Censorship weekly round-up

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Friday, 23 February 2024
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Blue and yellow paint on the road outside London's Russian Embassy ahead of last year's one-year anniversary. Photo: Led By Donkeys/Twitter

It's the two-year anniversary of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the news is full of pieces to commemorate it. But let's be honest, until this week we'd very much lost focus. Such a shift in gaze is not granted to those living in Ukraine and those from Russia opposed to the war, where it is still very much a horror show they're actively living in. Alexei Navalny's death (body still closely guarded) was a horrendous reminder of what's at stake. So too were videos that emerged of Russian police beating up people simply for laying flowers at memorials for Navalny. Some even looked like children. Children! And flowers! Flowers.

We're fearful for the dissidents in jail in Russia at the best of times, even more so now. There are many. I'd like to highlight two -

Vladimir Kara-Murza ([link removed]) . A Russian-British activist, journalist, author and filmmaker who was imprisoned in Russia for 25 years last April. He was found guilty of treason, spreading “false information” about the Russian armed forces and participating in an “undesirable organisation”. The court that sentenced him, his lawyer claims, are “slaves to (Vladimir) Putin’s regime”. Like Navalny, Kara-Murza entered prison already in a bad state, his kidneys weakened from presumed poisoning. Like Navalny, he's been moved from a more central prison to one in the far reaches of Russia. His lawyer described him to us: “Vladimir’s a brilliant, intelligent, thoughtful and brave man. It’s important the civil and international community don’t forget about him.”

Nariman Dzhelyal ([link removed]) . For Dzhelyal this is not a two-year anniversary but a 10-year one. Known by many as leader of the Crimean Tatars, a persecuted ethnic Muslim minority indigenous to the Crimean Peninsula, Dzhelyal has been in prison since 2021 (and also recently moved). He was sentenced to 17 years on trumped-up charges of “sabotage” after years campaigning for freedoms for Tatars and against Russia's illegal occupation of Crimea, which started in 2014. As Index CEO Ruth Anderson writes ([link removed]) in her blog today, individuals like Nariman Dzhelyal "remind us that the human spirit is indomitable in the face of oppression".

While these men languish in prison, Putin appears to be riding high. "With Navalny’s demise at age 47, further military assistance for Ukraine still blocked in Congress and Ukrainian forces retreating on the battlefield, a lot seems to be going Putin’s way a month ahead of a presidential election in Russia that he is certain to win," writes the journalist Catherine Belton. A depressingly true sentence.

Putin is not the only nasty man eager for re-election this year. So too is Narendra Modi. If it's the winds of fortune for Putin right now, could it be the winds of change for India's leader? It's unlikely given both Modi's popularity and his increasingly tight grip on dissent. Still, recent events have kept him on his toes.

Modi, who 10 years ago projected a hologram of himself to millions at rallies across India, is quite the digital maestro, in all the wrong ways. News of social media accounts being blocked, posts taken down, troll pile-ons have all defined his decade in power. But this week X actually pushed back, sort of.
The platform’s government affairs division posted the following notice yesterday:

“The Indian government has issued executive orders requiring X to act on specific accounts and posts, subject to potential penalties including significant fines and imprisonment. In compliance with the orders we will withhold these accounts and posts in India alone. However, we disagree with these actions and maintain that freedom of expression should extend to these posts.”

It's the first time X have spoken out against take down orders since Elon Musk took the platform over, which is significant, even if it didn't ultimately change anything. The accounts in question belong to farmers’ unions, activists and reporters, who are reporting on and/or part of what has been nicknamed the Farmers' Protest 2.0. They're making Modi sweat, as the farmers come from the politically crucial states of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. But are they making him sweat enough, or more to the point, what will he do next to ensure he stays on top? We should try to be one step ahead. If the Ukraine anniversary has taught us anything it's that we lose when we look the other way.

Jemimah Steinfeld, editor-in-chief


** Protest, and protesters, under attack
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After passing the Public Order Bill last year in the UK, which increased the powers of the police ([link removed]) to restrict people’s fundamental rights to peaceful protest, the government is looking to restrict protest rights further. It's not much better for protesters in the USA either. Daisy Ruddock speaks to those affected ([link removed])
Help support Index on Censorship ([link removed])


** Assange, the case for freedom
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Earlier this week a panel of High Court judges convened in London for the last stage of UK proceedings in the US government’s extradition case against Julian Assange. We reiterate our urgent calls ([link removed]) to free Assange.


** Pakistan's rebellion
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Independent candidates backed by the PTI, the party of former Prime Minister Imran Khan, won 93 seats in Pakistan’s National Assembly. Photo: World Economic Forum / Valeriano Di Domenico via Flickr
The military establishment tried to control the media narrative during the recent Pakistan elections, while internet blackouts became commonplace. And yet despite this, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) backed independent candidates bagged the largest number of seats in the national and provincial assemblies, in an upset for the military establishment. Ashraf Khan asks why ([link removed])


** Ukraine's resilience lights the way
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As we mark the second anniversary of Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine, it is imperative that we reflect not only on the ongoing conflict, the deaths, the child kidnapping, the sexual violence, the fear and the pain of the last two years, but also what came before and the impact on our collective human rights, writes our CEO Ruth Anderson ([link removed]) .


** Event: Scottish Anti-SLAPP Summit
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This coming Monday, 26 February, Index on Censorship, the University of Glasgow Law School and Justice for Journalists Foundation are bringing together targets of SLAPPs, lawyers, journalists, academics and campaigners to answer one simple question: What needs to happen to ensure Scotland is protected from SLAPPs? The Scottish Anti-SLAPP Summit is the first conference dedicated to this subject in Scotland and wherever you are, please join us. Sign up here ([link removed]) .


** From the Index archives
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** "It's not me, it's the people"
by Stephen Woodman
Summer 2019
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Mexico's leader Andrés Manuel López Obrador has once again proven he is not in favour of media freedom after he revealed the private phone number of a New York Times journalist who was looking into ties between his allies and cartels. Obrador rode into power with a mandate to make things better for the beleaguered press. But a year in the signs were already there that he was not a man of his word, as this 2019 article highlights ([link removed]) .
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Index on Censorship defends people's freedom to express themselves without fear of harm or persecution. We publish censored writers and artists, monitor and campaign against censorship, and encourage debate.

We rely on donations from readers and supporters. By donating ([link removed]) to Index you help us to protect freedom of expression and to support those who are denied that right.
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