Worldwide human rights specialists denounce ‘witch hunt’ towards Nobel Prize-winning group Memorial on Tuesday.

Russian safety forces have raided the houses of former staff of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning human rights group Memorial on Tuesday, taking a few of its members in for questioning, the group mentioned.

Based to doc political repression within the Soviet Union, Memorial was formally banned in late 2021 after the authorities claimed it supported terrorism and extremism, fees that it known as absurd.

Tuesday’s raids had been carried out after Russian investigators accused the now-dissolved group of allegedly together with the names of World Warfare II-era Nazi collaborators on its checklist of historic victims of political terror.

Police confiscated objects and gear carrying the Memorial emblem, the group mentioned, and took a few of its staff in for interrogation.

“At current searches of a number of the staff are persevering with — attorneys usually are not allowed to see them,” Memorial wrote on Telegram.

Memorial chairperson Yan Rachinsky, who collected the Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of the group in 2022, was additionally topic to a raid on his residence, the group mentioned.

The raids had been condemned by rights teams internationally in addition to what stays of Russia’s home opposition.

“By raiding the houses of members of Memorial, the Russian authorities are persevering with their witch hunt towards human rights defenders and activists,” Amnesty Worldwide’s Russia Director Natalia Zviagina mentioned in an announcement.

Opposition get together Yabloko mentioned the raids had been a “new step” in Russia’s marketing campaign of political repression.

“What occurred is an instance of the damaging battle towards dissent in Russia,” it defined in an announcement.

Since invading Ukraine in February 2022, President Vladimir Putin has accelerated Russia’s drive to suppress dissenting voices, together with unbiased media, nongovernmental rights teams and political opponents.

Putin has his personal Human Rights Council, a physique that critics say has enabled him to pay lip service to civic freedoms whereas ramping up state oppression.

Final November, shortly earlier than his annual assembly with the council, he eliminated 10 of its members and introduced in 4 new ones together with a pro-war blogger-correspondent.