A Russian court has fined migrant rights activist Tatiana Kotlyar 450,000 rubles ($4,900) on accusations of illegally registering foreigners at her home address, the independent news outlet Sota reported Monday.
Kotlyar, 72, is said to have registered more than 10,500 foreigners since 2009. Russian law requires foreigners with registration to have access to state social services, while those who are unregistered face a fine.
A court in central Russia’s Kaluga region found Kotlyar guilty of “fictitious registration of foreign citizens,” a criminal offense that carries a maximum sentence of three years in prison.
Prosecutors had requested the court to sentence Kotlyar to one-and-a-half years in prison.
This is Kotlyar’s seventh overall conviction on the same criminal charges.
Amnesty International last year accused the Russian authorities of continuing to marginalize at-risk individuals — including migrants, refugees and homeless people — by targeting Kotlyar.
In 2022, the European Court of Human Rights awarded Kotlyar compensation over what it found to be her unjust prosecution. Russia stopped carrying out the court’s rulings after invading Ukraine earlier that year.
Kotlyar, who heads the local branch of the “For Human Rights” movement, said she expects prosecutors to challenge the latest fine.
