This week our guest on the podcast is Grigory Vaypan. Until

recently, Grigory was head of the Litigation Department at the Institute forLaw and Public Policy where he led strategic human rights litigation before theConstitutional Court of Russia and the European Court of Human Rights. Since2013, Grigory has been developing the practice of amicus curiae at theConstitutional Court of Russia. Grigory teaches seminars on constitutionallitigation and writes articles on constitutional law and international law.

The topics discussed in the podcast include: Legal education

in Russia and the U.S. (at Moscow State University and Harvard Law School); TheGalina Starovoitova Fellowship at the Kennan Institute; Why become alawyer/advocate specialising in human rights issues; Court cases; Institute forLaw and Public Policy; The International Federation for Human Rights report: ‘Russia:Crimes Against History’; Last year's Constitutional Amendments; the EuropeanCourt of Human Rights; The laws on ‘foreign agents’ and ‘undesirable foreignorganisations’; Young lawyers in Russia today; The future of the justice system and human rights in Russia.

This podcast is in Russian. You can also listen to the

podcast on our website oron SoundCloud,  Spotify and  iTunes. 

The music, from Stravinsky’s Elegy for Solo Viola, is

performed for us by Karolina Herrera.

Sergei

Nikitin writes on Facebook: Moscow University, Harvard Law School, and St.Petersburg University are stages in Grigory Vaypan’s education in law. Inaddition to these institutions, Gregory spent three months at the KennanInstitute as a Galina Starovoitova Fellow. "The task of the Americaneducational system at Harvard is to intellectually inspire a person to accomplishthings in their profession,” says Grigory Vaipan. “The Russian system of highereducation is designed in a different way." Grigory has also worked at theInstitute for Law and Public Policy, where he was involved in developing nonprofitjurisprudence related to human rights cases in the constitutional court. Inaddition, a recent report written by Grigory Vaypan for the InternationalFederation for Human Rights (FIDH), entitled ‘Russia: Crimes Against History,’ hasattracted the attention of the reading public. This document discusses ‘how theRussian state monopolizes history.’ The author with justice states that ‘Russiais one of the countries that has passed the largest number of laws suppressingfreedom of expression on historical issues.’ These include a law against the ‘rehabilitationof Nazism.’ laws banning the use of Nazi symbols and attributes, laws againstextremism and terrorism, and more. The latest news from the Kremlin ideologicalfront, with its newly-formed Historical Enlightenment Commission - with thehelp of state law enforcement agencies fighting off all attempts to ‘falsify’the facts - only confirms the importance and timeliness of Grigory Vaypan'sreport.

Simon Cosgrove adds:  A summary of some of the

week’s events in Russia relevant to human rights can be found on ourwebsite here.