The Supreme Court upheld the sentence of human rights activist Kuperman from Sakhalin.
The Supreme Court upheld the sentence of Sakhalin human rights activist Mark Kuperman. He had previously been fined half a million rubles for "incitement to terrorism."
Приговор To Mark Cooperman, a well-known human rights activist with Sakhalin, remains in force. This decision was made by the Supreme Court after hearing a cassation appeal, in which Kuperman participated via video link. In June 2025, the human rights activist sentenced to a fine of half a million rubles on charges of "calls for terrorism."
"I had no illusions, but I thought they hadn't had a single acquittal under Article 205. And maybe, to prove their objectivity, they'd issue a [positive] decision in even the slightest significant case, where there wasn't even a minimal conviction, or at least remove Part 2 (appeals made in the media or online – NM). But no, they didn't even have the courage for that. It's all in line with the current trend."
— Mark Kuperman told NeMoskva.
Who is Mark Cooperman and what did he do?
Kuperman worked as a human rights activist on Sakhalin for many years, organizing the local branch of the democratic movement Solidarity, working for the Public Monitoring Commission (POC), and helping prisoners.
He was paralyzed after an accident in 2012. But he met with people at home, continued to help, and wrote appeals to regulatory authorities regarding a variety of Sakhalin residents' problems.
Criminal case against Mark Cooperman
The criminal case was sparked by a document he sent to friends and colleagues about the prospects for a change of power in Russia and Western involvement in this process. At one of the meetings where the letter was discussed, a provocateur from the security forces showed up and installed wiretapping. Despite the human rights activist's disability, security forces searched his apartment, and the courts Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk He was forced to appear in person and was not allowed to participate in the meetings via video link.
More details about Mark Kuperman's work on the island were reported by "NeMoskva" here.