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An international non-profit organization of scientists, physicians, engineers and scholars dedicated to protecting the human rights and scientific freedom of our colleagues around the world.

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Scientist Held on Seemingly Spurious Charges Ordered by Court to Cease Use of His Attorney for Court Appointed One

March 26, 2021

March 26, 2021

Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin
President of the Russian Federation
Ul. Ilyinka, 23
103132 Moscow,
Russian Federation
Fax: +7 495 9102134
Twitter: @KremlinRussia

Dear President Putin:

The Committee of Concerned Scientists is an independent organization of scientists, physicians, engineers and scholars devoted to the protection and advancement of human rights and scientific freedom for colleagues all over the world.

We write to express our concern over the continuing prosecution of scientist Yuri Alexeyevich Dmitriev – a defendant in a case of pedophilia and firearms related charges and to echo the calls by UN human rights experts on February 1st calling for his release. In particular, we are concerned by the recent move, this past month, by the Supreme Court in Karelia in agreement with the Petrozavodsk City Court, ordering him to stop using his own lawyer and engage a state appointed counsel instead – violating his right to select his own counsel.

Yuri Alexeyevich Dmitriev was initially arrested in December 2016, acquitted by a court in Petrozavodsk in 2018, sentenced by a higher court to three and a half years in prison in July 2020, and finally sentenced by the Karelia Supreme Court to 13 years in high-security prison. He is a Karelia regional leader of the human rights NGO Memorial, as well as a local historian studying Stalin-era mass graves of execution victims in Karelia, for which it is believed he is being targeted. As a 64-year-old, Dmitriev is in an at-risk group for catching COVID-19 in a high-risk location: prison.

As scholars, we know that an accurate understanding of the past is needed for thoughtful consideration of what should be done in the future.

We are concerned that our colleague Yuri Alexeyevich Dmitriev may be facing prosecution for simply investigating a particular era in history that is inconvenient for the government to acknowledge at the moment for whatever reason.

We write to urge you to ensure that he is treated fairly, that he is provided with adequate medical treatment, and regular access to family and independent legal representation of his own choosing. We further urge that whatever legal proceedings are held in his case meets international standards for fair trials. If he was, in fact, engaged in documenting his foster daughter’s health conditions, he must be released immediately and unconditionally.

Thank you for your attention to this serious matter. We will be closely following developments in this case.

Sincerely,

signatures
Joel L. Lebowitz, Paul H. Plotz, Walter Reich, Eugene M. Chudnovsky, Alexander Greer
Co-Chairs, Committee of Concerned Scientists
https://concernedscientists.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/signatures.png
cc.:
Anatoly Antonov
Ambassador
Embassy of the Russian Federation
2650 Wisconsin Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20007
Phone: 1 (202) 298-5700 I Fax: 1 (202) 298-5735
Email: rusembusa@mid.ru

Filed Under: CCS Cases, Russia Tagged With: Human Rights, Scientist, Yuri Alexeyevich Dmitriev

Who We Are

Co-chairs

Joel L. Lebowitz, Rutgers University

Paul H. Plotz, M.D., Washington, DC

Walter Reich, George Washington University

Eugene Chudnovsky, Lehman College

Alexander Greer, Brooklyn College

Vice-chairs

Astronomy – Arno Penzias, New Enterprises Associates*

Biology – Max E. Gottesman, Columbia University

Chemistry – Zafra Lerman, MIMSAD Inc.

Computer Science – Rachelle Heller, The George Washington University

Computer Science – Jack Minker, University of Maryland, College Park

Engineering – Philip Sarachik, NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering

Mathematics – Simon Levin, Princeton University

Medical Sciences – J. Joseph Blum, Duke University

Honorary Board Members

Nancy Andrews, Duke University

David Baltimore, California Institute of Technology*

Alan J. Bard, University of Texas

Jacob Bigeleisen (deceased), SUNY, Stony Brook

Raoul Bott (deceased), Harvard University

Owen Chamberlain (deceased), University of California, Berkeley

Stanley Deser, Brandeis University

Edward Gerjuoy, University of Pittsburg

David Gross, (2004 Nobel Prize in Physics), Kavil Institute for Theoretical Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara*

Pierre Hohenberg (deceased), New York University

Walter Kohn (deceased), University of California, Santa Barbara*

James Langer, University of California, Santa Barbara

Peter Lax, New York University

Louis Nirenberg, New York University

Marshall Nirenberg (deceased), National Institutes of Health*

Honorary Board Members

John C. Polanyi, University of Toronto*

Stuart Rice, University of Chicago

Sir Richard J. Roberts, (1993 Nobel Prize in Physiology & Medicine), New England Biolabs*

Myriam Sarachick, City College of New York

Harold Scheraga, Cornell University

Sylvan Schweber (deceased), Brandeis University

Maxine Singer, Carnegie Institution of Washington

Alfred I. Tauber, Boston University

Steven Weinberg, University of Texas, Austin*

Myrna Weissman, Columbia University

Rosalyn S. Yalow (deceased), Mount Sinai School of Medicine*

* Nobel laureate

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