Abuse & Violations

A variety of psychiatric measures are particularly prone to unintentional or intentional abuse. Unintentional abuse often takes place due to a lack of knowledge of those committing the abuse. Intentional abuse is the explicit use of psychiatric means for other purposes. The widespread use of a system of guardianship, where persons with psychiatric needs enjoy only limited rights, is one of such abuses if used by others for their advantage.

In authoritarian systems, the use of psychiatric diagnosis to silence human rights defenders, activists and those who dare to raise their voices against the government or members of the repressive regimes is resurging. Such diagnosis allows repressive governments to eliminate opposition without being publicly targeted as perpetrators of human rights violations. Invented in the former Soviet Union, and thought to have largely disappeared, it is now back on the agenda, in particular in Russia and China. Documenting and exposing such abuse is at the root of the FGIP, and has ever since been part of our priorities.

FGIP will continue to advocate for the plights and pleas of the victims of psychiatric abuse, both with international and regional human rights mechanisms, but in particular with global and regional psychiatric associations and their members.

Where necessary, the FGIP will provide its member organizations with the necessary means to engage with relevant authorities and partners in their countries to reform the existing guardianship system.

Political Abuse of Psychiatry in Russia

The list of cases presented here is the outcome of monitoring conducted by Federation Global Initiative on Psychiatry (FGIP) and The Andrei Sakharov Research Center.

This monitoring relies on publicly available sources, as we do not have the ability to obtain information from first hand sources within the Russian Federation. While not offering exclusive information, we consider this list a unique compilation of data illustrating the systematic abuse of psychiatry for political reasons in Russia.

The list is updated on a monthly basis. The victims’ years of birth are not always known; in some cases, we only have information about their age on the day of the published report, and we make assumptions about their year of birth.

Our sources include, but are not limited to, the following:

Memorial Human Rights Center: An independent project supporting political prisoners in Russia, implemented by the team of the liquidated Human Rights Center Memorial.
OVD-Info: An independent human rights defense and media group.
Caucasian Knot: An online media outlet focusing on human rights in the Caucasus region.
Mediazona: A Russian independent media outlet with a focus on the judicial, law enforcement, and penal system in Russia.