Law Against Rehabilitation of Nazism

The law introduced Article 354.1 to the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, making it a criminal offense "to deny facts recognized by the international military tribunal that judged and punished the major war criminals of the European Axis countries [this refers to the Nuremberg trials], to approve of the crimes this tribunal judged, and to spread intentionally false information about the Soviet Union’s activities during World War II" as well as "the spreading of information on military and memorial commemorative dates related to Russia’s defense that is clearly disrespectful of society, and to publicly desecrate symbols of Russia’s military glory".^[2]

Shortly after its passage, the law was used to convict Russian blogger Vladimir Luzgin, who compared the September 1939 German invasion of Poland to the Soviet invasion of Poland and referred to the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, writing on Russian social media platform VKontakte that "communism and Nazism closely collaborated". Prosecutors accused him of knowingly posting material that may worsen people's view of the Soviet Union, and the court agreed, stating that he had falsified history by stating "that the communists and Germany jointly attacked Poland, unleashing World War Two, or in other words, that Communism and Nazism co-operated honestly".^[3][4] Luzgin was fined 200 thousand rubles (roughly equivalent to US$7,000 in 2024) for "circulation of false information about the activities of the USSR during the years of World War II", though, as was noted by human rights expert Jacob Mchangama, this claim was "essentially, factually correct".^[5][6] In 2016 Lugzin appealed his case to the European Court of Human Rights.^[7]

In April 2015, Russian journalist Polina Petruseva was fined 1,000 rubles (US$21) for posting on the social media platform VKontakte a historical picture showing German Nazi troops in Russia, a picture otherwise available from, among others, Wikipedia.^[8][9] That same month, a number of Russian bookstores stopped selling the anti-Nazi graphic novel Maus because of a swastika appearing on its cover design.^[8] A toy store selling toy soldiers in wartime German uniforms was also investigated, and a museum displaying anti-Nazi Soviet posters, showing for example crushed swastikas, decided to censor all swastikas on its exhibits.^[10]

Works of two British historians, Antony Beevor and John Keegan, were banned in one of Russia's regions as the authorities accused them of being influenced by Nazi propaganda.^[4] A month later, another Russian journalist, Sergei Vilkov, was fined 1,000 rubles for posting a caricature on VKontakte (in 2011), which combined the logo of the United Russia and a swastika.^[11]

In March 2021 the Duma passed amendments to the law in the Criminal and Administrative Codes that envisage fines of up to 5 million rubles ($68,000) for entities or individuals convicted of the "public dissemination of knowingly false information" about WWII veterans. The changes were proposed after a Russian judge in February 2021 fined jailed opposition politician Alexei Navalny 850,000 rubles ($11,500) for slandering a 94-year-old WWII veteran who had participated in a Kremlin-organized promotional video.^[12] The bill was signed by Vladimir Putin in April 2021.^[13]