Moscow: The Sakharov Center, a museum in Moscow which is dedicated to Nobel Prize-winning rights activist Andrei Sakharov, is being forced to shut down by the end of April. For the past 30 years, it was a symbol of the post-Soviet human rights movement.
It features a permanent exhibition on Soviet repression. It was established by Sakharov's widow and rights activist Elena Bonner by leasing the premises from the government for free since the 1990s. The venue has hosted hundreds of debates and exhibitions.
In 2015, thousands gathered here to pay last respects to Boris Nemtsov, an opposition politician assassinated near the Kremlin walls. A year ago, the government had designated the venue a "foreign agent," a label with Stalin-era connotations. Now the museum is being shut down due to legislation that prohibits "foreign agents'' from receiving state aid.
The Sakharov Centre plans to build an online presence and store the contents in a warehouse that will be accessible to researchers. The Sakharov Center's director, Sergei Lukashevsky said the display dedicated to Soviet-era crimes could not exist in the country under the current circumstances.
Many consider the shutdown of the museum part of the clampdown on freedoms since the Russian invasion of Ukraine started. Critics of the government say that the Kremlin is widening the crackdown on dissent by putting opposing figures in jail or exile them or shutting down top rights groups. Others think the dark times will pass and rights organisations will eventually return.
Yan Rachinsky, co-head of the top rights group Memorial, told AFP that he is sure that it will not be long and he does not see a future for modern Russia without the Sakharov Center. Memorial was shut down in late 2021 months before the Ukraine war started. In January 2022, a court ordered the closure of Russia's oldest human rights organisation, the Moscow Helsinki Group.
Political activist Yulia Galyamina said, "You can't kill ideas or human communication." Poet Elena Sannikova said, "David will defeat Goliath, and a new dawn will break."