Russia detained a minimum of 20,467 people for political reasons in 2022, according to end-of-year statistics released recently by OVD-Info, among Russias leading independent human rights watchdogs.
A minimum of 19,478 of those were detained for speaking up versus Russias intrusion of neighboring Ukraine.
Other detentions occured at eco-friendly and workers rights demonstrations and protests versus a November law prohibiting LGBT propaganda.
Women represented nearly 45 percent of all those detained for expressing an anti-war position, according to the watchdog.Russia passed a total of 22 new repressive laws and there were only 29 days in 2022 without taped instances of political persecution, OVD-Info stated.
In addition to arrests and detentions, Russian authorities have likewise sought to punish dissent by identifying 176 organizations and people as foreign agents -- a Soviet-era term indicating espionage-- and acknowledging 22 entities as unfavorable -- a label that can lead to prosecution.
More than 210,000 sources of independent online information were blocked by Russia in 2022, according to OVD-Info.
The watchdog likewise taped a minimum of 17 circumstances of extra-judicial persecution of Russian reporters, consisting of an April attack on Nobel Peace Prize winner Dmitry Muratov, the editor-in-chief of independent news outlet Novaya Gazeta.