The poisoning of Kara-Murza: Australia imposes sanctions on 13 Russians

The Australian government has imposed sanctions against those involved in the poisoning of Russian opposition leader Vladimir Kara-Murza. This is stated in a statement by Foreign Minister Penny Wong, reports UNN.

Details

It is noted that Australia imposed financial sanctions and banned three agents of the Federal Security Service from entering Ukraine. In addition, the sanctions list includes ten more people associated with the politically motivated arrest, trial and sentencing of Kara-Murza.

According to Penny Wong, those involved in Russia's horrific repression of civil society, human rights defenders, independent journalists, opposition figures and minorities must be held accountable.

Australia calls on Russia to fulfill its human rights obligations under international treaties. We also call for the immediate and unconditional release of Kara-Murza and all other detained political activists

Addendum

According to the list published on the website of the Australian government, the sanctions include:

• Moscow City Court judges Vitaly Bilytsky and Ekaterina Dorokhina,
• Basmanny District Court judge Elena Lenskaya,
• prosecutor Boris Loktionov,
• Deputy Head of the Ministry of Justice Oleg Sviridenko,
• Head of the Main Investigation Department Denis Kolesnikov,
• investigator of the Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee Andrey Zadachin.

Context

There were allegedly two attempts to poison Kara-Murza, in 2015 and 2017. The results of the study, which was conducted in France at the request of the victim, showed multiple exceedances of manganese, zinc, copper and mercury concentrations.

Recall

After the outbreak  of a full-scale war in Ukraine, Russian opposition leader Vladimir Kara-Murza remained in Russia.

In the spring of 2022, he was detained on charges of spreading fakes about the Russian army, and then two more criminal cases were opened against him and he was accused of treason.