First initiative This first incarnation of Open Russia has been described by
The Guardian as a charitable organization. Its board included
Henry Kissinger and Lord
Jacob Rothschild. According to the
Moscow Times, the earlier incarnation of Open Russia funded “many philanthropic projects, including educational projects for young people, the Federation of Internet Education, the Club of Regional Journalism and projects of human rights
NGOs.” After Khodorkovsky's arrest in 2003, his deputy
Leonid Nevzlin took over Open Russia. He was succeeded by
Nikolay Bychkov. By 2005, Open Russia had 23 regional affiliates. On February 24, 2005, Russia's Federal Tax Service initiated an inspection of Open Russia, its third such probe in 12 months, which in the opinion of Open Russia was meant "to sully the only structure left in the hands of Mikhail Khodorkovsky.” The online relaunch ceremony was attended by prominent Russian activists and
émigrés, including
Sergei Guriyev and
Yevgeny Chichvarkin.
Objectives The new Open Russia declared that it would focus on several key areas including
independent media, political education, the rule of law, and support for political prisoners. Interviewed in an October 2014 article in the
Wall Street Journal, Khodorkovsky said he planned to use Open Russia to push for a constitutional conference that would shift power away from the presidency and toward the legislature and judiciary.
Activities On September 13–14, 2014, Open Russia presented talks by
Lyudmila Ulytskaya, Arina Borodina, and Dmitry Olshansky. The foundation's Open Lecture projected a series of live talks that toured across Russia. Open Russia reported that it will support twenty-five candidates in the upcoming September
parliamentary elections. Although it has yet to choose the candidates it will support, the organization has stated it already has two candidates from the Parnas party it is considering.
Russian state ban Open Russia, along with other dissident groups, was the target of an intensified crackdown by the Russian government in the 2010s. In mid-2017, the
Prosecutor General of Russia designated Open Russia as "undesirable" under the 2015
Russian undesirable organizations law, effectively banning its activities in Russia.
Amnesty International noted that, while previous
civil society groups had been targeted by the law, the designation of Open Russia marked the first time that the Russian government banned "a civil society group that was founded by Russians and operates only in Russia."
Suspension of activities in Russia Ahead of the parliamentary elections in September 2021, the Russian government increased its pressure against opposition voices, where a draft law was being processed that increased the criminal liability of participants of undesirable organisations and enables them to be jailed. Based on this, Open Russia announced on 27 May 2021 that it would stop its operations in Russia in order to protect its members from criminal prosecution and the risk of being imprisoned in the country. In July 2022, a former head of the organisation, Andrey Pivovarov, was sentenced to four years in prison for "carrying out the activities of an undesirable organization", alleging he was still working with the organization based in London, after he made Facebook posts allegedly criticizing the
Federal Security Service and supporting opposition protesters. ==Reactions==