Elections 
Campaign advertisements for presidential candidate Mikhail Prokhorov were reported on 21/2 to have been illegally torn down in cities across Russia. (The Moscow Times, 22/2) 

Media 
On 14/2 a painting by Aleksandr Savko ‘Sermon on the Mount’ was ruled extremist by Kaluga region court. (HRO.org, 14/2) 

On 14/2 Aleksei Venediktov, editor of Ekho Moskvy radio, said he and his deputy will resign in protest from the board after majority owner GazpromMedia demanded the ouster of two independent board members. (The Moscow Times, 15/2) 

Ekho Moskvy’s Aleksei Plushchev said hackers had taken over his e-mail and blog accounts. (The Moscow Times, 16/2) 

Russian MTV pulled a new talk show, Gosdep, in which members of the country's opposition had been given a voice presented by Ksenia Sobchak. (The Moscow Times, 15/2) 

On 16/2 head of web television channel Dozhd said Moscow prosecutors had requested information about how the channel financed coverage of protest rallies. (The Moscow Times, 17/2) 

French journalist Anne Nivat, detained on 10/2, was expelled on 12/2 for alleged visa violations. On 16/2 head of the migration service condemned the decision and said Nivat will be allowed to return to Russia. (The Moscow Times, 14/2, 17/2) 

On 17/2 the FSB searched a bank owned by Aleksander Lebedev who funds Novaya gazeta. (The Moscow Times, 20/2) 

Elections 
Prime minister Putin refused to meet election observers from the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly. (RFE/RL, 11/2) 

On 13/2 the League of Voters said Russian TV channels were violating the law and broadcasting campaigning materials exclusively on behalf of Vladimir Putin. (HRO.org, 13/2) 

On 15/2 independent election monitor Golos said it had been forced to move its Moscow office. (The Moscow Times, 16/2) 

Hundreds of protesters drove cars around in central Moscow on 19/2 to demand free elections in Russia. (The Guardian, 19/2) 

On 16/2 the European Parliament called on the Russian authorities to investigate comprehensively and transparently all reports of fraud and intimidation. (RFE/RL, 16/2) 

Protests against electoral fraud 
Tens of thousands of people marched in Russia's capital Moscow in protest at electoral fraud on 4/2. (BBC, 4/2) 

Boris Akunin, member of the League of Electors and of the organizing committee of the election protests, called for a joint opposition strategy for the presidential elections. (HRO.org, 6/2) 

Authorities in the Siberian city of Barnaul declared it is now illegal to organize antigovernment demonstrations using toy collections unless they have official permission. (RFE/RL, 10/2) 

Elections 
The director of a Moscow training center lost her job for refusing to ensure her employees’ attendance at a rally on 4/2 in support of PM Putin’s presidency bid. (RIA Novosti, 6/2) 

In a video released on 8/2 Irina Kolpakova, an electoral commission official in charge of a polling station in Samara, told how the authorities sought to falsify results in the December parliamentary elections. (RFE/RL, 9/2) 

On 8/2 the Russian Supreme Court upheld a Central Election Commission decision to bar liberal opposition politician Grigory Yavlinsky from next month's presidential election. (RFE/RL, 8/2) 

On 8/2 at a meeting with PM Vladimir Putin the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, characterized Putin's time in charge of Russia as a “miracle.” (RFE / RL, 9/2) 

Justice system 
Interior Ministry investigators are ready to bring the case against late lawyer Sergei Magnitsky who died in pre-trial detention and his employer, Hermitage Capital CEO William Browder, to court, the company said on 7/2. (The Moscow Times, 8/2) 

On 8/2 Jamison Firestone, head of the Firestone Duncan consulting company and former boss of the lawyer Sergei Magnitsky,appealed to the presidential candidates to stop the “mockery” of Magnitsky's family. (HRO.org, 9/2) 

On 8/2, two days after PM Putin said there are no political prisoners in Russia, two activists submitted to the presidential administration a list of 39 inmates whom they describe as “political prisoners.” (RIA Novosti, 9/2) 

On 10/2 head of the St. Petersburg police Mikhail Sukhodolsky was sacked following an investigation into the death in custody of a 15-year-old boy. (The Moscow Times, 13/2) 

On 9/2 a senior Kommersant executive demanded the Prosecutor General's Office open a criminal case against officials at the pro-Kremlin youth group Nashi for being behind an Internet attack on the paper several years ago. (The Moscow Times, 10/2)

North Caucasus 
Officials said an Islamist warlord, seven militants, four officers and one civilian were killed in three separate incidents in the North Caucasus on 27/1. (The Moscow Times, 30/1) 

On 3/2 Doku Umarov, leader of Islamist rebels in Russia's North Caucasus, ordered fighters under his command to halt attacks on Russia's civilian population. (RFE/RL, 3/2) 

Protests for free and fair elections 
On 29/1, hundreds of cars with white ribbons, banners and balloons protested in Moscow against electoral fraud and urged PM to step down. (The Moscow Times, 30/1) 

On 30/1 independent elections watchdog Golos said PM Putin had illegally started campaigning before the official start of the campaign season. On 31/1 the Central Elections Commission said articles published by Putin in three newspapers were not part of his presidential campaign. (The Moscow Times, 31/1; 1/2) 

Moscow schoolteachers have been ordered to attend a rally supporting PM Putin planned for 4/2. (The Moscow Times, 31/1) 

According to a poll by Levada Centre, 49% of Russians think the upcoming presidential elections will be fair, while 78% think Vladimir Putin will again become head of state. (HRO.org, 1/2) 

On 31/1 organizers of the protest rally set for 4/2 said rally would call for the release of political prisoners, democratic reforms, and fresh parliamentary elections. (The Moscow Times, 1/2) 

Tabloid news website Life News said on 1/2 it did not break the law in publishing private telephone conversations of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, because the information contained in the recordings served the public interest. (The Moscow Times, 2/2) 

Some 27,000 signed up on Facebook to take part in a protest in Moscow on 4/2 to demand fair elections, the third such rally since State Duma elections on 4/12. (The Moscow Times, 3/2) 

Rights defenders / Civil society activists 
Russian activists say they have come under pressure from police and security services in advance of their next big protest against contested elections. (The Guardian, 2/2) 

Philip Kostenko, an activist who works at Memorial’s Anti-Discrimination Center in St. Petersburg, was victim of a brutal attack on 3/2. (Human Rights First, 3/2) 

Hate crime 
On 3/2 the Supreme Court of Russia rejected Alexei Voevodin and Artem Prokhorenko’s appeals for clemency. In June 2011, they received life sentences for committing a series of racially-motivated murders. (Human Rights First, 3/2)

North Caucasus 
On 20/1 law enforcement officials shot and killed Umar Saidmagomedov, a Dagestani lawyer, and local resident Rasul Kurbanov, in Makhachkala, Dagestan. (HRW, 26/1) 

On the night of 21/1 rights defender and lawyer Anton Ryzhov was detained for some hours by police in Nizhny Novgorod on his return from Chechnya. (OMCT, 24/1) 

Elections 
Russia is technically capable of organizing fair elections but so far lacked the political will, a report by the PACE said on 23/1. (The Moscow Times, 24/1) 

On 24/1 Liliya Shabanova, executive director of Golos, an independent election monitor, said that her staff had been forced to leave their offices in central Moscow. (HRO.org, 25/1) 

Independent election monitor Golos said it plans to deploy 2,000 observers during the 4/3 presidential election and launched its map of election violations on schedule. (RFE/RL, 25/1) 

The human rights organization Moscow Helsinki Group said on 26/1 it was ready to share its offices with Golos. (HRO.org, 26/1) 

On 27/1 Russian election authorities formally disqualified Grigory Yavlinsky, of the Yabloko party, from running in the 4/3 presidential election. (RFE/RL, 27/1) 

PM Putin's promise to equip Russia’s polling stations with web cameras does not remove the need for election observers, head of the OSCE observer mission said. (The Moscow Times, 27/1) 

Protests 
The Moscow Mayor's office agreed late on 25/1 to allow organizers of a "For Fair Elections" action to hold a rally on 4/2 for up to 50,000 people. (RFE / RL, 26/1) 

Police in Barnaul asked prosecutors to investigate the legality of a recent protest that saw dozens of small dolls arranged to mimic a protest. (The Guardian, 26/1) 

Media rights 
On 25/1 the international media freedom monitor Reporters Without Borders downgraded Russia in its annual Press Freedom Index, to 142nd from 140th place. (RIA Novosti, 26/1) 

LGBT rights 
Runners in a race in Kaliningrad region were detained by police who thought they were gay activists. (The Moscow Times, 25/1) 

President Medvedev 
Medvedev postponed a meeting with his human rights council set for 26/1 for the fourth time. (The Moscow Times, 24/1)

Human rights defenders 
On 18/1 Igor Kalyapin, head of the Committee Against Torture, was informed by the Investigative Committee that the head of the Chechen special OMON police units had requested that he be investigated for “disclosure of State secrets”. (OMCT, 19/1) 

On 19/1 hundreds of people marched in central Moscow in memory of human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasia Baburova, who were gunned down in broad daylight on a central Moscow street in 2009. (RFE / RL, 20/1) 

On 20/1 charges, brought against head of Memorial Rights Centre Oleg Orlov for alleged slander of President of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov, were dropped. (Amnesty International, 20/1) 

Detentions 
On 14/1 Moscow police have detained two Yabloko party officials after a protest rally against election fraud. The rally was sanctioned for 300 participants, but police counted about 350. (The Moscow Times, 16/1) 

Police detained all eight members of an all-girl punk group called Pussy Riot who sang an anti-Putin song on Red Square. Four may face prison after being charged with non-criminal public order offences and disobeying police. (The Telegraph, 20/1) 

Media rights 
Chelyabinsk region Investigative Committee halted the prosecution of the blogger Andrei Ermolenko for lack of evidence. Experts established officials and deputies of legislative assemblies were not a social group. (Openinform.ru, 16/1) 

Vladimir Putin fiercely criticized Ekho Moskvy radio station and its editor-in-chief on 18/1. (The Independent, 20/1) 

Investigators in the Urals Federal District said on 19/1 they had filed extremism charges against Vladimir Yefimov, editor of the Vechernyaya Tyumen weekly, accusing him of inciting hatred against police officers. (The Moscow Times, 20/1) 

Protest movement 
On 16/1 a League of Voters was founded by 16 individuals including Leonid Parfenov, Yury Shevchuk and Boris Akunin. (HRO.org, 17/1) 

On 18/1 Prime Minister Vladimir Putin suggested that the oppositionist stance taken by writer Boris Akunin was due to his Georgian heritage. (RFE/RL, 19/1) 

Opposition politicians Gennady Gudkov and Vladimir Ryzhkov said on 18/1 they would seek criminal charges against those responsible for secretly filming them and posting their conversation on the Internet. (The Moscow Times, 19/1)

Pre-trial detention 
Russia must reduce the number of remand detainees, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in a judgment on 10/1. The court said detainees were subjected to inhumane treatment and had no adequate means of redress. (RIA Novosti, 11/1) 

State Duma elections: aftermath 
The 4/12 State Duma elections failed to meet democratic standards and were fraught with violations, the OSCE said in a report published on 12/1. (The Moscow Times, 13/1) 

In a televised message on Orthodox Christmas Day, Patriarch Kirill said the Kremlin should heed the recent mass protests over ballot-rigging and adjust its policies. (BBC, 7/1) 

On 10/1 opposition groups said they would hold a rally near the Kremlin on 4/2, stepping up pressure on Prime Minister Vladimir Putin over a controversial election win by his party on 4/12. (The Moscow Times [Reuters], 12/1) 

Presidential elections 
Vladimir Putin will not take part in Russian presidential election debates because of his duties as prime minister, his spokesman has announced. (BBC, 12/1) 

Dmitry Mezentsev, a Russian presidential candidate with close links to the Kremlin, denied that his campaign organisers have been cheating. Mezentsev’s team has been accused of hiring students to fill in fake lists of supporters. (BBC, 11/1) 

Human rights defenders / Civil society activists 
Moscow's Tverskoi court ruled on 7/1 the administrative detention of Russian opposition activist Sergei Udaltsov, arrested on 4/12, which ended on 4/1, was lawful. (RIA Novosti, 8/1) 

On 10/1 St. Petersburg investigators asked prosecutors for the second time to drop charges against Leonid Nikolayev and Oleg Vorotnikov of radical art group Voina in relation to a stunt in which they overturned police cars. (The Moscow Times, 11/1) 

On 10/1 activists said they would stage protests across Moscow in support of Taisiya Osipova, an opposition activist, jailed for 10 years in Smolensk on drug charges. (The Moscow Times, 10/1) 

On 12/1 the Moscow region's Federal Arbitration Court backed two lower court decisions to throw out Aleksei Navalny's lawsuit against a VTB Group daughter company, which he alleges laundered about $160 million. (The Moscow Times, 13/1) 

Chechnya 
Four Russian security personnel and at least three Islamist militants were killed in clashes in Chechnya in fighting that began on 8/1, Russia's Interior Ministry said. (BBC, 9/1)

Election fallout 
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, speaking in a televised message on 31/12, said there was nothing unusual in the mass protests against his domination of Russia. Putin called protests “the unavoidable price of democracy.” (RFE/RL, 31/12) 

On 5/1 Central Election Commission chief Vladimir Churov, speaking on Echo of Moscow radio, dismissed protesters’ demands he step down over alleged fraud and said he would listen only to the nations’ leaders. (The Washington Post, 5/1) 

On 5/1 senior Russian Orthodox Church official Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin said the authorities should respond to people’s concerns. On 3/1 Aleksei Navalny said he would like to see the Church act as a mediator. (New York Times, 6/1) 

On 6/1 ex-finance minister Aleksei Kudrin wrote in his blog that the government should agree to hold fresh parliamentary elections. (Newsru.com, 6/1) 

Protestors 
On 31/12 police arrested about a dozen protesters trying to attend a Moscow rally in defence of the right of assembly. Some of those arrested wore white ribbons, the sign of protest against electoral fraud. (BBC, 31/12) 

On 4/1 Sergei Udaltsov, the leader of the Left Front movement, in detention since 4/12, was released from prison. (BBC Russian Service, 4/1) 

On 4/1 Yaroslav Nikitenko, deputy head of a group fighting a Moscow-to-St. Petersburg highway project that runs through Khimki Forest, was released from detention. Nikitenko was detained at a late-December rally in support of Udaltsov and also released on 4/1, after serving a 10-day sentence. (RFE/RL, 5/1) 

Law enforcement personnel 
As PM Putin prepares to resume the presidency, reports said officials appointed by President Medvedev are expected to be removed from law enforcement departments. (Newsru.com, 3/1) 

Voina 
The art collective Voina announced on 2/1 that its members had incinerated a police vehicle on 31/12 at a St Petersburg police station used to transport prisoners. (The New York Times, 2/1) 

Canadian lawyer barred 
Winnipeg lawyer and human rights activist David Matas has been banned from speaking publicly in Russia in connection with a book entitled Bloody Harvest that he and co-author David Kilgour published in 2009 about the persecution in China of members of the Falun Gong. (Winnipeg Free Press, 4/1)

24 December demonstrations against electoral fraud
Organizers said up to 120,000 people took aprt in a Moscow rally against election fraud on 24/12. (The Guardian, 24/12)

In St. Petersburg several thousand demonstrators took part in a protest against alleged election fraud on 24/12. (RFE/RL, 24/12)

On 24/12 in Nizhny Novgorod more than 20 participants in a rally for fair elections that did not have official permission were detained. (Committee Against Torture, 26/12)

Sergei Udaltsov
On 25/12, a Moscow court sentenced Sergei Udaltsov to 10 days in jail for allegedly resisting police during a 24/10 protest he staged near the Central Elections Commission. (RFE / RL, 26/12)

On 27/12 a Moscow court postponed until 7/1 the hearing of an appeal of a 10-day jail sentence handed to Sergei Udaltsov, who has been hospitalized. (The Moscow Times, 28/12)

Moscow City Hall on 28/12 banned a rally in support of jailed Sergei Udaltsov and other political prisoners. St. Petersburg authorities allowed a rally on 29/11. (The Moscow Times, 29/11)

On 29/12, several hundred people protested in Moscow against the continued detention of Sergei Udaltsov. (RFE / RL, 30/12)

Election fall-out
On 24/12 the presidential council on human rights called on head of the Central Election Commission Vladimir Churov to resign in relation to alleged electoral fraud. (RIA Novosti, 24/12)

On 29/12, a Moscow court upheld a 30,000 rouble fine levied against independent election watchdog Golos on 2 December for allegedly violating election legislation. (Rights in Russia, 29/12)

Pre-trial detention
On 27/12 the Presidential Human Rights Council in a report called for a thorough investigation into the death in pre-trial detention of Sergei Magnitsky. (RIA Novosti, 27/12)

Businesswoman Natalia Gulevich, in pre-trial detention since 12/2010 with acute kidney failure, was given a three-year suspended sentence on fraud charges on 26/12 and released. Gulevich said she would appeal the verdict. (RIA Novosti, 26/12)

A court in Smolensk on 29/12 sentenced Taisiya Osipova, an opposition activist in pre-trial detention since 11/2010, to 10 years in prison for drug trafficking. (RIA Novosti, 30/12)

LGBT rights
On 27/12 Kostroma region passed in its first reading an anti-gay law banning LGBT organizing and public actions. Five protestors were arrested. (San Diego Gay & Lesbian News, 30/12)

Protests over alleged election fraud 
Over 7,000 people protested in St. Petersburg on 18/12 against alleged falsified election results. (The Other Russia, 18/12) 

Aleksei Navalny, a key figure in the rallies after the disputed parliamentary elections, left jail in Moscow on 21/12 after serving 15 days for obstructing police. (BBC, 21/12) 

Public figures called on President Medvedev not to bring security forces into Moscow during the 24/12 rally. (HRO.org, 21/12) 

The presidential human rights council called (23/12) for Vladimir Churov, head of the Central Election Commission, to resign over alleged violations during the 4/12 elections. (RIA Novosti, 24/12) 

The central election commission rejected Eduard Limonov's candidacy for the March presidential election. (RFE/RL, 19/12) 

The Net 
More than 40,000 people signed up on Facebook for a protest rally against violations at the 4/12 State Duma elections on Prospect Sakharov on 24/12. (The Moscow Times, 23/12) 

Attackers hacked into the LiveJournal blog and Gmail account of prominent author Boris Akunin in apparent punishment for his participation in opposition rallies. (The Moscow Times, 20/12) 

The leader of Russia's Orthodox Church warned Russians on 23/12 against trusting social networking sites saying they made people “vulnerable to manipulation.” (Reuters, 23/12) 

Opposition activists accused the authorities of seeking to sow discord in their ranks by posting recordings of Boris Nemtsov’s phone conversations on a pro-Kremlin website. (RFE/RL, 20/12) 

Yukos affair 
The presidential council on human rights said 21/12 former Yukos CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky and his business partner Platon Lebedev had been jailed illegally in their second trial and their verdicts should be overturned. (The Moscow Times, 22/12) 

Dubrovka theatre case 
The European Court of Human Rights ruled Russia must pay compensation to each of 64 people for violations resulting from the Kremlin's handling of the 2002 seizure of a Moscow theatre by Chechen terrorists. (The Daily Telegraph, 20/12) 

Freedom of expression/conscience 
India has approached top Russian authorities to resolve the move to ban Hindu scripture Bhagvad Gita, saying it is one of the defining treatises of Indian thought. (DNA, 22/12) 

Alexandr Savko's artwork Sermon on the Mount, depicting Mickey Mouse as Jesus Christ, was declared extremist for a second time by a court in Kaluga oblast. (Gazeta.ru, 21/12)