Vadim Kobzev, Alexei Liptser and Igor Sergunin received prison sentences ranging from 3.5 to 5.5 years in retaliation for providing legal services to the late, jailed opposition leader, Alexei Navalny.
This statement was originally published on hrw.org on 22 January 2025.
Unprecedented verdict seen as retaliation for defending opposition leader
Last week, a Russian court sentenced three lawyers who had represented the country’s leading opposition politician, Alexei Navalny, to imprisonment on bogus extremism charges following a sham trial.
Vadim Kobzev, Alexei Liptser, and Igor Sergunin received prison terms ranging from three and half to five and a half years, in retaliation for providing legal services to Navalny. Navalny, whom Russian authorities deemed a political threat, died suddenly, last year, in a prison colony in the far north. He was serving a 19-year sentence imposed for a litany of spurious and politically motivated charges. The Kremlin bears responsibility for his death.
The lawyers were arrested in October 2023 and accused of participating in an “extremist organization,” The prosecution claimed the lawyers “used their status” to act as “intermediaries” and facilitate the exchange of messages between Navalny and his associates, thereby contributing to the functioning of Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation, which authorities designated “extremist” in 2021. Two other lawyers who used to represent Navalny, Alexander Fedulov and Olga Mikhailova, fled Russia in the face of similar charges, and are now on a wanted list.
When the draconian sentences were announced, Mikhailova emphasized that the lawyers were being punished explicitly for “doing their professional duty” and doing it well. “The verdict is not only legal nonsense but also represents an open and cruel attack against the very institution of the bar,” Mikhailova said.
Politically motivated state harassment against lawyers isn’t new. Last week’s verdict, however, marks the first time in Russia’s contemporary history that the authorities have punished lawyers specifically for doing their job, i.e. interacting with their client and passing on information from the client to his family and colleagues. It sends a chilling message to all independent lawyers in the country: do not offer your services to political prisoners unless you want to land in prison yourself. The UN Special Rapporteur on Russia, Mariana Katzarova, called the sentences “appalling,” and urged the authorities to immediately release the three lawyers and “end the severe crackdown on the legal profession in Russia.”
I could not agree more. The authorities should quash this unjust and preposterous verdict, immediately free Kobzev, Liptser, and Sergunin, and let Russian lawyers to “work safely and without fear.”
