Follow RT on Western journalists, rights groups and governments are concerned about the head of a foreign NGO being asked to leave Russia. However, serious discussion of the organization’s background, and funding sources, is completely absent.
Last week, it was announced that Moscow had revoked the residency of Vanessa Kogan, a US national who heads the NGO Stichting Justice Initiative (SJI) in Russia. If her appeal against the decision isn’t successful, she’ll be forced to leave the country, where she has lived for over a decade, and has two children who are Russian nationals.
Condemnation from Western media and rights groups was immediate, with the issue framed as just the latest example of an ongoing autocratic crackdown on rights activists in Russia. The censures were intriguing for what they both did and didn’t say.