Russia

Country Profile

Russia continued its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and its armed forces committed numerous war crimes and other atrocities and abuses, leading the International Criminal Court to issue arrest warrants for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Children’s Rights Commissioner Maria Lvova-Belova in relation to the forced deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia. Authorities used new laws to punish dissent and independent expression in Russia, according to human rights defenders. Authorities jailed antiwar protesters and political opposition figures, prosecuted numerous individuals for online expression, forced closure of nongovernmental organizations, further restricted media outlets, pressured political parties, and continued transnational repression against critics of the Kremlin abroad. Authorities escalated persecution of political opposition figures, sentencing Vladimir Kara-Murza to 25 years in prison following conviction of charges including treason and the already imprisoned Aleksey Navalny to an additional 19 years for alleged “extremism.”

There were credible reports of summary execution, torture, rape, and attacks killing and injuring civilians and damaging or destroying civilian infrastructure by Russia’s forces in Ukraine, as well as war crimes, including those involving forced deportation or transfer of civilians, and the forced placement in foster care or adoption of Ukrainian children. The government operated an extensive system of filtration and detention operations that sometimes included the use of forced labor. Russia’s occupation and purported annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula and four oblasts in Eastern Ukraine affected significantly and negatively the human rights situation there, with credible reports of politically motivated arrests, detentions, and trials of Ukrainian citizens in Russia, many of whom claimed to have been tortured (see also Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for Ukraine).

Outside of human rights abuses committed by Russia in relation to its invasion of Ukraine, significant human rights issues included credible reports of: arbitrary or unlawful killings, including extrajudicial killings; enforced disappearances; pervasive torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment by the government; harsh and life-threatening prison conditions; arbitrary arrest or detention; serious problems with the independence of the judiciary; political prisoners or detainees; transnational repression against individuals in another country; arbitrary or unlawful interference with privacy; punishment of family members for alleged offenses by a relative; serious abuses in a conflict; unlawful recruitment or use of child soldiers in armed conflict; serious restrictions on freedom of expression and media freedom, including violence or threats of violence against journalists, unjustified arrests or prosecutions of journalists, censorship, or enforcement of threat to enforce criminal libel laws to limit expression; serious restrictions on internet freedom; substantial interference with the freedom of peaceful assembly and the freedom of association, including overly restrictive laws on the organization, funding, or operation of nongovernmental and civil society organizations; restrictions of religious freedom; restrictions on freedom of movement and residence within the territory of a state and on the right to leave the country; refoulement of refugees; inability of citizens to change their government peacefully through free and fair elections; serious and unreasonable restrictions on political participation; serious government corruption; serious government restrictions on or harassment of domestic and international human rights organizations; extensive gender-based violence, including domestic or intimate partner violence and sexual violence; crimes involving violence or threats of violence targeting members of ethnic and religious minority groups; trafficking in persons, including forced labor; crimes involving violence or threats of violence targeting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, or intersex persons; crimes involving violence or threats of violence targeting persons with disabilities; and the worst forms of child labor.

The government did not take adequate steps to identify and punish most officials who may have committed human rights abuses.

There were credible reports personnel of the Kremlin-backed Wagner Group committed widespread human rights abuses and atrocities in Ukraine and countries in the Middle East and Africa in which they operated. Authorities did not investigate or prosecute such actions.