Strasbourg Observers

View posts from: Foreign Agents Law

  • Joseph Finnerty

The importance of judicial diction in the face of autocratisation: Reflections following Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) and Others v. Russia

April 21, 2026

by Joseph Finnerty States are increasingly adopting laws which place additional restrictions on civil society and media actors when they receive foreign assistance—financial or otherwise—for their advocacy or reporting activities. So-called ‘foreign agent’ laws are quickly becoming ubiquitous in autocratising contexts (see, most recently, the proposals emerging in Czechia). They vary in scope and in […]

  • Maxim Krupskiy

Kobaliya and others v. Russia: Perverted transparency or when legislation on ‘Foreign Agents’ bears the hallmarks of a totalitarian regime?

January 17, 2025

Maxim Krupskiy Kobaliya and others v Russia concerns ‘foreign agent’ legislation in Russia and the way it developed since 2012. Russian legislation on ‘foreign agents’ had first come before the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR, the Court) in Ecodefence and Others v. Russia, where the Court found substantial violations of Article 11 (read in […]

  • Jessica Gavron

The ECtHR and the Russian Foreign Agents’ Law – a devastating case of judicial passivity  

April 28, 2022

By Jessica Gavron The traumatic saga of the liquidation of International Memorial and Memorial Human Rights Centre (MHRC), has been subsumed by the even more shocking events that have followed. However, the liquidation of these two renowned and revered human rights institutions was a momentous event for civil society in Russia. For many, the elimination […]