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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 23h

A physicist who helped develop the Soviet hydrogen bomb, he became a human rights defender and later Memorial’s honorary chairman. He defended political prisoners, opposed nuclear testing and was sent into internal exile after speaking out against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 23h

On this day, 9 October 1975, Andrei Sakharov was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Politkovskaya reported on war crimes committed by the Russian state and helped the people she wrote about. The organisers stress that remembering her work matters today, as Russia continues to commit war crimes in Ukraine and suppress freedom of expression at home.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Strasbourg Mayor Catherine Trautmann, Emilia Koustova of Mémorial-France, and Alexander Cherkasov of the Memorial Human Rights Defence Centre Memorial Human Rights Defence Centre will unveil the plaque. They will be joined by representatives of the city and civil society.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Mémorial-France is organising the event with support from the City of Strasbourg and the Strasbourg European Press Club.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Strasbourg will honour Anna Politkovskaya with a memorial plaque on 10 October, 20 years after her murder. The unveiling ceremony will begin at 5 p.m. at Place Brant.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

She wrote about war, state violence and people with nowhere else to turn. Her reporting still helps explain Russia today — and raises questions those in power have never answered.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 07/10/2026

Today, October 7, marks twenty years since the murder of Anna Politkovskaya.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

This October calendar brings together dates connected to state terror, deportations and resistance across the former Soviet Union, as well as repression in Russia today. What do you remember or commemorate in October? #memoryactivism #memory_activism

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

It can mean reading names aloud, researching a family history, visiting a memorial site or creating an exhibition. It also opens space for conversations about how the past is remembered and how it shapes the present.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 05/10/2026

What can remembering do? Memory activism uses remembrance as a form of civic action — preserving the stories of people affected by repression and bringing overlooked or silenced experiences into public space.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

They were detained again during the crackdown on the camp’s resistance network and, on 4 April 1945, shot just a week before US troops entered Dora.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

In 1943, Szymczak was transferred to Mittelbau-Dora, where he became deputy to fellow communist Georg Thomas. Both were connected to resistance inside the camp and, in March 1944, were imprisoned after refusing an SS order to hang a Soviet prisoner.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

A German communist who had moved to the USSR in 1930, Szymczak was arrested and tortured during Stalin’s Great Terror. After his expulsion to Nazi Germany, the Gestapo imprisoned him and eventually sent him to Buchenwald.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Arrested in Stalin’s Soviet Union and expelled to Nazi Germany, Ludwig Szymczak became a victim of two dictatorships.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Today, the initiative also draws attention to political prisoners in Russia and Ukrainian prisoners of war: their names are read alongside those of victims of Soviet repression. More information: october29.live

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Returning the Names began as a Memorial initiative in Moscow in 2007. Since then, it has grown into an international practice of remembrance, with readings taking place in different countries, languages and settings.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

On 29 October, people in cities around the world will read aloud the names of victims of Soviet state repression. #ReturningTheNames #October29

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Dmitriev believes he suffered a minor stroke. Prison doctors diagnosed a hypertensive crisis. Yet, according to his lawyer, no brain scan or blood tests have been carried out. It is still unclear what treatment Dmitriev is receiving — or whether his condition could deteriorate.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Dmitriev can speak normally and his coordination has improved. But he remains weak, the left side of his body is still numb, and he has difficulty moving his left arm.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Update: Yuri Dmitriev’s condition On 29 September, Yuri Dmitriev’s lawyer was finally able to visit him in the prison hospital, four days after the 70-year-old historian was urgently hospitalised with a suspected stroke.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Dmitriev was first arrested in December 2016 and has been in custody continuously since June 2018. He is serving a 15-year sentence in a case Memorial considers fabricated and politically motivated.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

For decades, Dmitriev documented Stalinist repression. He helped uncover the Sandarmokh execution site and restored the names of thousands of victims. His work received international recognition, including awards from the Norwegian Helsinki Committee and the Moscow Helsinki Group.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

On 25 September, 70-year-old historian and political prisoner Yuri Dmitriev was urgently transferred to a prison medical facility with a suspected stroke.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

And Yabloko, the only registered party campaigning for a ceasefire, was thrown off the State Duma ballot, while its supporters faced detentions and police warnings.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

The state kept pushing back. Food historian Pavel Syutkin got six years for a post about Bucha. Opposition politician Lev Shlosberg got 11 years for anti-war speech. Lida Moniava, co-founder of a children's hospice, was charged with spreading "fake news" about the army.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

People across Russia kept finding ways to oppose the war. Anti-war messages covered walls in Moscow and beyond, and resistance groups reported sabotage against railways, power infrastructure and enlistment offices.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

Fragments of resistance and repression across Russia, August–September 2026

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

🎟️ Zukunft is also giving away three pairs of tickets on Instagram later this week — keep an eye on their page for details.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

• Egor Shamshurin-Landry — Zukunft Memorial • Peter Franck — lawyer and board member of the German Sakharov Society • Tamina Kutscher — journalist, Slavist and historian • Thomas Franke — author and journalist

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

🕛 12:00 — Film screening Russian with German subtitles 🗣 13:15–14:00 — Discussion in German Speakers include:

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

🎬 Berlin: Film Screening & Discussion — 27 September On 27 September, Zukunft Memorial invites you to a screening of Mr. Nobody Against Putin, followed by a discussion. 📍 filmkunst66 Bleibtreustraße 12, 10623 Berlin

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

In September, Nobel Peace Prize laureates and more than 90 civil society initiatives appealed to US negotiators Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff to put these issues on the negotiating agenda.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

The People First campaign is calling for their release, return and protection to be addressed from the very beginning of negotiations — rather than left until a final political settlement.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Thousands of people remain detained, imprisoned, deported or separated from their families as a result of Russia’s war against Ukraine and related repression.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

Peace talks are already underway. But a ceasefire or peace agreement does not automatically bring everyone home.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Some of these legacies were physical, with camp infrastructure surviving long after the Gulag itself. Others were less visible: researchers have traced its impact on burial practices and sacred places, relationships between the living and the dead, and beliefs about spirits and the land.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

Mines, roads, railways and settlements transformed how these lands and their resources were used, while Soviet policies reshaped Indigenous communities and ways of life.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

The history of the Gulag is also a history of the lands on which it was built. Across Siberia and the Arctic, camps appeared on territories that had been home to Indigenous peoples for centuries.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

We also look at two recent steps towards accountability: Finland’s conviction of a Russian neo-Nazi fighter for war crimes committed in Ukraine, and Ukraine’s first conviction of a Russian prisoner of war for rape as a war crime.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

In this month’s digest, we look at cases documented by the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group: civilians held incommunicado and tortured, long prison sentences for supporting Ukraine, repression in occupied Crimea, the rewriting of history in schools, the redistribution of property in Mariupol.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Russia’s war against Ukraine continues far beyond the front line.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Based in part on historian Jeffrey S. Hardy’s research, “Of Pelicans and Prisoners: Avian–Human Interactions in the Soviet Gulag.”

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

But animals could mean something different to prisoners. They adopted cats, fed pigeons through cell windows, watched birds and drew animals in letters home. They could become companions, reminders of home and symbols of freedom.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Animals were part of the Gulag in ways both ordinary and unexpected Dogs guarded prisoners, horses transported goods, and prisoners raised livestock. Rats, insects and harsh natural conditions made camp life even harder.

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Memorial in English @enmemorial.bsky.social · 07/09/2026

Elena Zhemkova, Executive Director of Zukunft Memorial, spoke to France 24 about Russia’s war against Ukraine, repression inside Russia, and the role of state propaganda. She warned of a “huge repressive mechanism” in Russia and “very powerful and sophisticated propaganda.”

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