69-546: Memorial (Russian: Мемориал , IPA: [mʲɪmərʲɪˈaɫ] ) is an international human rights organisation , founded in Russia during the fall of the Soviet Union to study and examine the human rights violations and other crimes committed under Joseph Stalin 's reign. Subsequently, it expanded the scope of its research to cover the entire Soviet period. Memorial is the recipient of numerous awards, among others
138-519: A few specified exceptions, Article 111 of the Code stated that judicial hearings in the USSR should be held in public. Such protests against closed trials continued throughout the post-Stalin era. Andrei Sakharov , for example, did not travel to Oslo to receive his Nobel Peace Prize due to his public protest outside a Vilnius court building demanding access to the 1976 trial of Sergei Kovalev , an editor of
207-400: A human rights group from other political elements of any given society is that while political advocates usually seeking to protect only the rights of their own constituents, a human rights group seeks to defend the same rights for all members of that or any other society. Unlike political groups which seek to advance their own discrete interests or programs a human rights group attempts to keep
276-589: A joint expedition of the St. Petersburg and Karelian Memorial Societies led by Dmitriev, Irina Flige, and Veniamin Joffe found 236 common graves containing the bodies of at least 6,000 victims of Stalin–era purges , executed in 1937 and 1938. In 2016, the Russian government attempted to revise this account, claiming that among the dead were Soviet POWs shot by invading Finns in 1941–1944. Memorial representatives challenged both
345-506: A key source of trustworthy information about human rights in the post-Stalin Soviet Union. The launch of the online version was held at Memorial's office in Karetny. Many former editors of the underground publication attended, including Sergei Kovalev and Alexander Lavut . Memorial has funded or helped to produce various publications and films related to human rights. This included the documentary The Crying Sun (2007), which focused on
414-583: A petition to the 19th All-Union Conference of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) in 1988, and that body supported Politburo proposals for the creation of a monument to the victims of political repression during the cult of personality under Stalin . A similar decision by the 22nd Congress of the CPSU in 1961 had been ignored for many years. A significant juncture in Memorial's development
483-561: A political slogan for increased government transparency in the Soviet Union within the framework of perestroika , and the calque of the word entered into English in the latter meaning. In the Russian Empire of the late-19th century, the term was used in its direct meanings of "openness" and "publicity" and applied to politics and the judicial system . Some reforms were introduced towards reforms permitting attendance of
552-521: A single-issue advocate it has also ventured into issues that are not clearly human rights. There are some governmental organisations that are also named human rights group, such as the UK's All-Party Parliamentary Group on Human Rights , but which are primarily reporting groups for the purpose of policy design. Glasnost Glasnost ( / ˈ ɡ l æ z n ɒ s t / GLAZ -nost ; Russian: гласность , IPA: [ˈɡlasnəsʲtʲ] )
621-766: A study of the "national" operations conducted by the NKVD during the Great Terror , 1937–1938. Examining the available documents, they noted that the FSB, successor to the NKVD and KGB , had not fulfilled the terms of a June 1992 edict issued by President Boris Yeltsin . This demanded that all legislative acts and other documentation that "served as the basis for mass repressive measures and violations of human rights" should be declassified and made publicly available within three months. The Great Terror involved "crimes against humanity" and
690-511: A unitary system, as of December 2021 Memorial encompassed over 50 organizations in Russia and 11 in other countries, including Kazakhstan , Ukraine , Germany , Italy , Belgium and France . Although the focus of affiliated groups differs from region to region, they share similar concerns about human rights, documenting the past, educating young people and marking remembrance days for the victims of political repression . Memorial emerged during
759-404: Is a concept relating to openness and transparency. It has several general and specific meanings, including a policy of maximum openness in the activities of state institutions and freedom of information and the inadmissibility of hushing up problems. In Russian, the word glasnost has long been used to mean 'openness' and 'transparency'. In the mid-1980s, it was popularised by Mikhail Gorbachev as
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#1732773385646828-606: The Chronicle of Current Events and prominent rights activist. In 1986, Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev and his advisers adopted glasnost as a political slogan, together with the term perestroika . Alexander Yakovlev , Head of the Propaganda Department of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , is considered to be the intellectual force behind Gorbachev's reform program. Glasnost
897-709: The Goethe Medal for her work relating to Memorial's activities. In 2009, Memorial HRC was awarded the Victor Gollancz Prize by the Society for Threatened Peoples . In 2012, Memorial was awarded the Custodian of National Memory prize by the Institute of National Remembrance . On 4 February 2015, Lech Wałęsa nominated Memorial International for the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize. Memorial was awarded
966-619: The Helsinki Groups of the late Soviet period, said Roginsky, and he named the Chronicle of Current Events (1968–1982) and its compilers as a model to be emulated. Memorial was founded on 26–28 January 1989 as a "historical and educational" society at a conference held in the Moscow Aviation Institute. Two years later a distinct Memorial Civil Rights Defense Center was also set up. In a random poll conducted on
1035-671: The Nobel Peace Prize in 2022 . Prior to its dissolution in Russia in early 2022, it consisted of two separate legal entities, Memorial International , whose purpose was the recording of the crimes against humanity committed in the Soviet Union, particularly during the Stalinist era , and the Memorial Human Rights Centre , which focused on the protection of human rights , especially in conflict zones in and around modern Russia. A movement rather than
1104-575: The dissolution of the Soviet Union , Memorial was reconstituted as an International NGO , a "historical, educational, human rights and charitable society", with organizations in several post-Soviet states (Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan , Latvia , and Georgia ), as well as in Germany, the Czech Republic , Italy, and France. According to its post-Soviet 1992 charter , Memorial pursued the following aims: Its online database contains details of
1173-514: The perestroika years of the late 1980s, to document the crimes against humanity committed in the USSR during the 20th century and help surviving victims of the Great Terror and the Gulag and their families. Between 1987 and 1990, while the USSR was still in existence, 23 branches of the society were established. When the Soviet Union collapsed, branches of Memorial in Ukraine remained affiliated to
1242-409: The 2008 seizure in St. Petersburg of much of the materials on which the project was based (see § Persecution for further information), and faced with a need to update the information (and the technology), it was decided to create a map of the burial grounds, graveyards and commemorative sites across Russia. Launched in Russian in 2016, an English-language version, "Russia's Necropolis of Terror and
1311-542: The 2022 Nobel Peace Prize along with Belarusian human rights activist Ales Bialiatski and the Ukrainian human rights organisation Centre for Civil Liberties . Berit Reiss-Andersen , the head of the Norwegian Nobel Committee , stated that the recipients "have made an outstanding effort to document war crimes, human rights abuses and the abuse of power", however the committee stated that the choice
1380-595: The 411 burial grounds and commemorative sites included on the "Russia's Necropolis" website. Memorial worked on the law "On Rehabilitation of Victims of Political Repression". Throughout its existence, but particularly since 2012, the International Memorial Society has widened its range of activities. Today these include the Last Address project and, following the example of Berlin and its Topography of Terror excursions and exhibitions,
1449-751: The Gulag" followed in August 2021. This resource documents over 400 sites, some dating back to the Russian Civil War , noting their state of preservation, monuments and ceremonies, and whether they have protected status. It includes the killing fields of the Great Purge such as Krasny Bor , the abandoned burial grounds of the Gulag, and also 138 graveyards of the "special" settlements to which "dekulakized" peasant families and then Poles, Lithuanians and others were deported in their tens of thousands. At
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#17327733856461518-638: The Kovalevsky Woods near St. Petersburg, Memorial attempted to construct a National Memorial Museum Complex to commemorate the 4,500 victims who were killed and buried there during the Red Terror . Memorial workers discovered the bodies in 2002. A memorial complex already exists at the Sandarmokh killing field (1937–1938) in Karelia, thanks to the efforts of Yury A. Dmitriev . In July 1997,
1587-840: The Order of the Politburo of the Bolshevic Communist Party from 5 March 1940 Onwards (Moscow 2015), with 4 415 biograms of the victims. Gurianov Aleksandr, ed. Those Killed in Kalinin, buried in Mednoye. The Memorial Book of Polish Prisoners of War - Prisoners of the Ostashkov Soviet NKVD Camp, Shot Dead at the Order of the Politburo of the Bolshevic Communist Party from 5 March 1940 Onwards (Moscow 2019) Both titles were launched on 17 September, to
1656-483: The Russian Federation after its invasion of Ukraine , including the closure of Memorial) made this impossible as of 2024. In the early 21st century, Memorial in St. Petersburg worked to create the "Virtual Gulag" Museum in order to bring together research and archives from all over the former Soviet Union and to commemorate and record the existence of the Gulag and the lives of its inmates. Disrupted by
1725-524: The Russian Federation". Oleg Orlov , a board member of Memorial, commented that the prize represents "much-needed moral support at a difficult time for rights activists in Russia". A cash reward, which comes with the prize, of € 50,000 was awarded to Memorial in December 2009. The writer and historian Irina Scherbakowa , a founder and staff member of Memorial, was given the Ossietzky Award and
1794-806: The Russian Federation, as well as refugees from Africa, Asia and the Middle East. In 2008, Memorial won the Hermann Kesten Prize . In 2009, Memorial won the Sakharov Prize of the European Union, in memory of murdered Memorial activist Natalya Estemirova . Announcing the award, President of the European Parliament Jerzy Buzek said that the assembly hoped "to contribute to ending the circle of fear and violence surrounding human rights defenders in
1863-702: The Russian network. Some of the oldest branches of Memorial in northwest and central Russia, the Urals and Siberia later developed websites documenting independent local research and published the crimes of the Soviet regime in their region. After the Russian foreign agent law was passed in July 2012, Memorial came under increasing government pressure. On 21 July 2014, the Memorial Human Rights Centre
1932-567: The Soviet Union and the West. Gorbachev's interpretation of "glasnost" can best be summarised in English as "openness". While associated with freedom of speech , the main goal of this policy was to make the country's management transparent, and circumvent the holding of near-complete control of the economy and bureaucracy of the Soviet Union by a concentrated body of officials and bureaucratic personnel. During Glasnost, Soviet history under Stalin
2001-423: The Soviet period. Another project is the "Open List" database, created in several languages of the former Soviet Union (Russian, Ukrainian, Georgian and Belarusian) to encourage relatives and descendants of those shot, imprisoned and deported to contribute information about the victims and their families. This expanded sources of information beyond the case files kept on individuals by the Soviet security services or
2070-508: The USSR, glasnost was frequently linked with other generalised concepts such as perestroika (literally: restructuring or regrouping) and demokratizatsiya (democratisation). Gorbachev often appealed to glasnost when promoting policies aimed at reducing corruption at the top of the Communist Party and the Soviet government, and moderating the abuse of administrative power in the Central Committee . The ambiguity of "glasnost" defines
2139-650: The USSR. Quoting the RLA jury: "for showing, under very difficult conditions, and with great personal courage, that history must be recorded and understood, and human rights respected everywhere if sustainable solutions to the legacy of the past are to be achieved." In the same year, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) named Memorial HRC as the winner of the annual Nansen Refugee Award for its wide range of services on behalf of forced migrants and internally displaced people in
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2208-616: The United States and Western Europe began to be transmitted to the Soviet population, along with western popular culture. Glasnost received mixed reception in communist states, especially outside the Eastern Bloc . Glasnost had a trickle-down effect on Eastern Europe and lead to democratic reforms, namely in Poland and Czech Republic. Glasnost and similar reforms were applied in the following communist states: Furthermore, in
2277-510: The abuse of power". Memorial's creation was a response to growing public awareness of historic abuses within the Soviet Union (USSR) during the 1980s, as well as concern about contemporary human rights, especially in certain hotspots around the USSR. This took place within the context of perestroika (reconstruction) and glasnost (openness), policies pursued by president Mikhail Gorbachev which led to increased government transparency and tolerance of civil society. An earlier statement of
2346-550: The awards ceremony. The jury has been headed in the past by Otto Sigurd, Svetlana Aleksiyevich and Ludmila Ulitskaya . To date, 26 collections of winning entries have been published: the majority of these can be found on the "Lessons of History" website. Memorial had a special Polish programme headed by Aleksandr Gurianov . Together with the Polish KARTA Center , the Memorial Polish programme researched
2415-405: The conflicts that are often causes of the human rights abuses. Often human rights groups claim expert knowledge on the issue or issues it surveys through human rights observers as field researchers . One of the best known international human rights groups is Amnesty International . However it, like many other groups, has stretched the definition of a human rights group because aside from not being
2484-603: The crime and the exhumations, and a roll-call of the respective victims with biogram and picture, where available. They are based on analogous Polish publications, but include additional information on the Katyn Massacre and expanded biograms. The four publications are: Gurianov Aleksandr, ed. Those Killed in Katyn. The Memorial Book of Polish Prisoners of War - Prisoners of the Kozelsk NKVD Camp, Shot Dead at
2553-466: The crimes of the Soviet secret police . Some of these goals became feasible in the late 1980s when several activists such as Lev Ponomaryov , Yuri Samodurov , Vyacheslav Igrunov , Dmitry Leonov, and Arseny Roginsky proposed a complex to commemorate the victims of Stalinism . Their concept included a monument, a museum, an archive, and a library. An "all-Union informal movement" organized and submitted
2622-551: The date on the anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland : the book on Katyn in 2015, on the 75th anniversary; and the three volumes on Mednoye on the 80th anniversary, in 2019. Memorial was planning to continue the project and publish a volume on the Katyn Massacre committed at the Kharkov Regional Directorate of the NKVD, however the events after 2019 (the COVID-19 pandemic and the policy pursued by
2691-551: The distinctive five-year period (1986–1991) at the end of the USSR's existence. There was decreasing pre-publication and pre-broadcast censorship and greater freedom of information . The "Era of Glasnost" saw greater contact between Soviet citizens and the Western world, particularly the United States: restrictions on travel were loosened for many Soviet citizens which further eased pressures on international exchange between
2760-499: The emergence of the Soviet civil rights movement. Protesters on Pushkin Square led by Alexander Yesenin-Volpin demanded access to the closed trial of Yuly Daniel and Andrei Sinyavsky . The protestors made specific requests for "glasnost", herein referring to the specific admission of the public, independent observers and foreign journalists, to the trial that had been legislated in the then newly issued Code of Criminal Procedure. With
2829-522: The goals later pursued by the Memorial Society was made by Brezhnev era dissidents in February 1974, following the deportation of dissident writer Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn from the USSR. They called for publication in the USSR of Solzhenitsyn's The Gulag Archipelago , the opening of all secret police archives relating to the past, and the organization of an international tribunal to examine
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2898-683: The late Soviet period have remained affiliated with the Russian network. A noted centre for work both on historical materials and current human rights concerns is the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group , an affiliate organisation since February 1989, which today runs the "Human Rights in Ukraine" portal. In 2004, the Memorial Human Rights Centre (HRC) was among the four recipients of the Right Livelihood Award , for its work in documenting violations of human rights in Russia and other former states in
2967-697: The mass executions of nearly 22,000 Polish military officers and soldiers, policemen, officials, intelligentsia and others conducted at Stalin's order by the NKVD in Katyn , Kalinin , Kharkiv , Kyiv and probably near Minsk in April and May 1940. The result of this research are four publications on the murders, all edited by Gurianov: one volume on Katyn, where NKVD officers murdered at least 4,400 regular army officers and reserve officers; and three volumes on Kalinin, were 6,300 policemen and prison guards and border guards were shot dead. Both titles contain an introduction on
3036-492: The mass media. Some critics, especially among legal reformers and dissidents, regarded the Soviet authorities' new slogans as vague and limited alternatives to more basic liberties. Alexei Simonov, president of the Glasnost Defence Foundation, makes a critical definition of the term in suggesting it was "a tortoise crawling towards Freedom of Speech". Between 1986 and 1991, during an era of reforms in
3105-524: The motivation behind this claim and the purported new evidence intended to support it. In 2008, Memorial HRC launched an online version of the noted samizdat publication A Chronicle of Current Events , which had been distributed in the Soviet Union. Appearing at irregular intervals during the year, it was circulated in typescript form ( samizdat ) in the USSR from 1968 to 1983. All of its 63 issues were also translated into English and published abroad. Western observers and scholars considered it to be
3174-864: The one hand, to hotspots around the Soviet Union and Russia, the two wars in Chechnya, conflicts with neighbouring countries, especially Georgia and Ukraine , and, on the other hand, to the regime within Russia under Vladimir Putin and his administration. Human rights organisation A human rights group , or human rights organization , is a non-governmental organization which advocates for human rights through identification of their violation, collecting incident data, its analysis and publication, promotion of public awareness while conducting institutional advocacy, and lobbying to halt these violations. Like other NGOs, human rights groups are defined in their characteristics by legal, including taxation, constraints under which they operate, such as What distinguishes
3243-591: The organization in Russia. Over time it has become an independent human rights organization based in Germany. Memorial Italia has been operating since 2004. Memorial Belgium was founded in 2007. Later, branches of the International Memorial were also set up in the Czech Republic (2016) and most recently a French branch came into existence in April 2020. In eastern and southern Ukraine, as noted earlier (§), Memorial organisations set up during
3312-414: The police. Memorial's archives have been used by historians such as Briton Orlando Figes . Since 1999, Memorial has organised an annual competition for secondary school students around the theme of "The Individual and History: Russia in the 20th century". It received between 1,500 and 2,000 entries each year. Authors of the 40 best contributions are invited to Moscow to attend a special school academy and
3381-565: The political process open to all legitimate participants in the societal conflicts where such human rights violations occur. This generally independent focus distinguishes human rights groups from sectarian and partisan groups such as for example trades unions , whose primary goal is to protect the interests of the members of unions. Human rights groups are sometimes confused with humanitarian organizations and groups representing lobbies focused on specific issue lobbies, while most seek to distinguishing themselves from political movements involved in
3450-400: The press and the public at trials. After some liberalization under Alexander II of Russia , the openness of trials started to be restricted again. Human rights activist Lyudmila Alexeyeva writes that the word glasnost has been in the Russian language for several hundred years as a common term: "It was in the dictionaries and lawbooks as long as there had been dictionaries and lawbooks. It
3519-432: The radicals. The conference was addressed by dissidents Larisa Bogoraz and Elena Bonner (wife of dissident scientist Andrei Sakharov ), and by the octogenarian writer Oleg Volkov , an early inmate of the Gulag 's Solovki camp . In a report to the Politburo, KGB head Kryuchkov singled out Arseny Roginsky , future chairman (1998–2017) of International Memorial, as particularly outspoken. Memorial should become an heir to
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#17327733856463588-750: The scope of the project should not be restricted to the Stalin era because repressive measures had begun with the October Revolution under Vladimir Lenin . On 6 July 1989, Memorial organized its first public event by picketing the Chinese Embassy in Moscow in protest over the Tiananmen Square Massacre . Memorial was not formally recognized until 1990 when the organization acquired official status. On 19 April 1992, after
3657-701: The socialist state of Yugoslavia , similar reforms also existed, with the first major reforms beginning in Slovenia . Glasnost or similar reforms were not applied in the following communist states: The outright prohibition of censorship was enshrined in Article 29 of the new 1993 Constitution of the Russian Federation . This however has been the subject of ongoing controversy in contemporary Russia owing to heightened governmental interventions restricting access to information for Russian citizens, including internet censorship . There has also been pressure on government-operated media outlets to not publicize or discuss certain events or subjects in recent years. Monitoring of
3726-402: The society has organised similar educational ventures about the Soviet era in Moscow and other Russian cities. In 2005, Memorial's database contained records of more than 1,300,000 victims of political repression in the Soviet Union. First issued as a CD, by 2020 the fifth edition of the database was available online and held over three million entries of those shot, imprisoned or deported during
3795-485: The streets of Moscow, respondents named many whom they thought suitable candidates for the Memorial Society's board of trustees. The second most popular was Andrei Sakharov , who had won a Nobel Peace Prize in 1975 for his efforts to promote civil liberties within the Soviet Union; Sakharov became the first Memorial chairman. The exiled Solzhenitsyn was also named but he declined the invitation, saying he could do little to help from abroad; in private, he told Sakharov that
3864-423: The two-day event. Secretaries of several creative unions (architects, designers, artists and filmmakers) were present as potential trustees of the proposed organization. More radical voices were also heard, including those of the Moscow Popular Front, the newly founded Democratic Union , and uncensored periodicals such as Glasnost and Express Chronicle . Members of the Moscow Action Group of Memorial were among
3933-414: The victims of political repression in the USSR ; the fifth version contains over three million names, although Memorial estimated that 75% of victims had not yet been identified and recorded. Memorial organized assistance, both legal and financial, for the victims of the Gulag. It conducts research into the history of political repression and shares the findings in books, articles, exhibitions, museums, and
4002-404: The village of Zumsoy in Chechnya , and the struggle of its citizens to preserve their cultural identity in the face of military raids and enforced disappearances by the Russian army and 'guerilla' fighters. The 25-minute film was produced in collaboration with WITNESS . International Memorial has branches in several European countries. Memorial Germany was founded in 1993 in Berlin to support
4071-422: The websites of its member organizations. Moscow Memorial was among the organisations that persuaded the Russian authorities to follow the long-standing dissident tradition of marking 30 October each year, transforming it into an official Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Political Repressions . Over the next thirty years this date was adopted across Russia: by 2016 annual events were held on 30 October at 103 of
4140-501: Was an academic and a founding member of Memorial, while Prudovsky began by researching the fate of his grandfather and has spent the last ten years on a wide-ranging study of political repression in the 1930s. The growing list of prisoners of conscience and political prisoners in Russia (the Memorial Human Rights Centre issued a list of 377 names on 9 November 2021) reflected the link always drawn by Memorial between past atrocities and present-day violations of human rights. This referred, on
4209-408: Was an ordinary, hardworking, non-descript word that was used to refer to a process, any process of justice or governance, being conducted in the open." In the mid-1960s it acquired a revived topical importance in discourse about the necessity of changing the Cold War era internal policy of the Soviet Union. On 5 December 1965 the Glasnost rally took place in Moscow, considered to be a key event in
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#17327733856464278-636: Was closed and liquidated by the Moscow City Court as violating the "Foreign Agent" Law. On 5 April 2022, the Russian Court of Appeal confirmed the dissolution. Some of Memorial's human rights activities continued in Russia. Memorial continues to operate in other countries, notably in Germany where its oldest and largest non-Russian chapter is based. In October 2022, Memorial was one of the three laureates of that year's Nobel Peace Prize , alongside Ukrainian human rights organisation Centre for Civil Liberties and Belarusian activist Ales Bialiatski , for their efforts in "document[ing] war crimes, human rights abuses, and
4347-434: Was declared a "foreign agent" by the Ministry of Justice . The label was extended in November 2015 to the Research & Information Centre at St. Petersburg Memorial, and on 4 October 2016 to Memorial International itself. On 28 December 2021, the Supreme Court of Russia ordered Memorial International to close for violations of the foreign agent law. A lawyer for Memorial said it would appeal. The Memorial Human Rights Centre
4416-429: Was its Moscow conference on 29–30 October 1988. After the failure of officialdom to force the postponement of the conference, it gathered 338 delegates from 57 cities and towns. In a report to the Politburo dated 16 November the new KGB head, Vladimir Kryuchkov , observed that 66% of the delegates came from Moscow and the Moscow Region. Kryuchkov decried "provocative statements" made by dissidents and young activists during
4485-418: Was not made against Putin, who launched an invasion of Ukraine in February of that year. Memorial also received the 2022 Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe Democracy Defender Award, jointly with Ukrainian Human Rights Centre ZMINA, for courageous and important efforts to promote human rights and democracy. In April 2021, Memorial researchers Sergei Krivenko and Sergei Prudovsky published
4554-413: Was ordered shut by the Moscow City Court on 29 December 2021; state prosecutors accused it of breaching the foreign agent law and supporting terrorism and extremism. On the same day, the European Court of Human Rights applied an interim measure instructing Russia to halt the forced dissolution of Memorial, pending the outcome of litigation. On 29 December 2021, HRC Memorial as a legal entity in Russia
4623-417: Was re-examined; censored literature in the libraries was made more widely available; and there was a greater freedom of speech for citizens and openness in the media. It was in the late 1980s when most people in the Soviet Union began to learn about the atrocities of Stalin, and learned about previously suppressed events. Information about the supposedly higher quality of consumer goods and quality of life in
4692-403: Was taken to mean increased openness and transparency in government institutions and activities in the Soviet Union (USSR). Glasnost reflected a commitment of the Gorbachev administration to allowing Soviet citizens to discuss publicly the problems of their system and potential solutions. Gorbachev encouraged popular scrutiny and criticism of leaders, as well as a certain level of exposure by
4761-424: Was therefore subject to no statute of limitation. In 1968, the USSR acceded to the UN Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity . Decades later, and thirty years after the 1992 presidential edict, the researchers were filing cases in the courts to pressure regional branches of the FSB to release documents about the Great Terror over 80 years earlier. Krivenko
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