The European Court of Human Rights on June 18 ruled unanimously that Russia violated the European Convention on Human Rights when it labeled several foreign organizations operating in Russia as "undesirable" and when it prosecuted Russians for being involved with those organizations.
The court said in a statement on June 18 that the "undesirable" designation was a violation of the convention's article on freedom of assembly and freedom of association with regard to four applicants based outside Russia -- the Free Russia Foundation in Washington, the Ukrainian World Congress in Toronto, the Association of Schools of Political Studies of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, and the Spolecnost Svobody Informace in Prague.
The unanimous decision by a seven-member panel of judges from Andorra, the Netherlands, Cyprus, Albania, Greece, Switzerland, and Bulgaria also determined that there had been a violation of the convention's article on freedom of expression and the article on freedom of assembly and association with respect to "all applicants who had been convicted for their involvement with 'undesirable organizations.'"
The court said that the decision was handed down in a case filed by the Andrey Rylkov Foundation and others against Russia concerning the designation of the four foreign organizations as "undesirable" and the prosecution of individuals for engaging in activities with other organizations that had likewise been declared "undesirable."
The court held that the law, signed by President Vladimir Putin in 2015, "had not been formulated with sufficient precision to enable the applicant organizations to foresee that their otherwise lawful actions would result in their designation as 'undesirable' and a prohibition on their activities in Russia," the statement said.
The four organizations based outside Russia were designated as "undesirable," while the other applicants were convicted for having been involved with organizations that had received a similar designation.
The four organizations complained that that two criteria used to designate them as undesirable had been "unforeseeable" and had "impinged on their freedoms of expression and association." The remaining applicants complained of their convictions for involvement with "undesirable" organizations.
The 2015 change in Russian law introduced a new power for the prosecutor-general to designate any non-Russian entity or NGO as an "undesirable organization" when it has been determined that the organization undermined "the foundations of the Russian constitutional order, defense capabilities, or national security of Russia."
The law gave the authority to maintain a register of "undesirable organizations" to the Justice Ministry, which as of April 2024 listed more than 150, including RFE/RL, according to the judgement.
The law, widely condemned in the West, had legal and practical consequences resulting in a ban on the operations in Russia of designated organizations.
The designation imposed severe restriction on an organization, including bans on having offices or carrying out projects in Russia, using Russian bank accounts, disseminating content through the media, and on the public accessing their websites from within Russia.
Human Rights Watch said in 2017 that the Russian government was using the "draconian and deliberately vague law" to target Russians it claimed were linked to "undesirable" foreign organizations.
In addition to the Andrey Rylkov Foundation, the other Russian organizations convicted of involvement with "undesirable organizations" are the Ekologicheskaya Vakhta Po Severnomo Kavkazu, Akoo Molodyye Zhurnalisty Altaya, and a number of other Russian nationals.