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On September 14, 2023 the European Court for Human Rights ordered the Russian government to pay Azat Miftakhov 26,000 Euro as compensation for the torture to which Azat was subjected by the Russian police after his initial arrest in February 2019. Azat has been continuously imprisoned since that arrest. In January 2021 he was convicted of “hooliganism” in the infamous “broken window” case, related to a protest at a United Russia party office, and sentenced to six imprisonment years in a penal colony. Although Azat was released on parole from the Omutninsk colony on September 4, 2023, he was immediately re-arrested by the FSB on a new fabricated charge of “justifying terrorism”.

We welcome the finding of he European Court for Human Rights holding Russia responsible for torturing Azat while in prison. 

Unfortunately, although not unexpectedly, on September 15, the Kirov Oblast’ Court denied Azat’s appeal against his arrest and continued detention in the new “justifying terrorism” criminal case. The travesty and the tragedy of political persecution against Azat needs to end. The new made up charges against him need to be dropped. Azat needs to be immediately released. He has suffered more than enough and he deserves to be able to resume his mathematical studies and research.

The Azat Miftakhov Committee

English translation of an article published in Le Monde by Benoît Vitkine on September 6, 2023

Released from prison on Monday, the anarchist activist sentenced in 2021 for the attack on a premises in United Russia was arrested again.Investigators accuse him of remarks “justifying terrorism” made in detention. 

By Benoît Vitkine (Moscow, correspondent)

Azat Miftakhov only tasted freedom for a handful of minutes, the time to cross the few meters separating the gates of the IK-17 penal colony, in the city of Kirov, from those of the police van waiting for him. outside. Released after four and a half years in prison, this young mathematician whose case is the subject of significant attention in Russia and abroad was immediately arrested on his release, Monday, September 4. 

In 2019, the anarchist activist was arrested for having, according to the prosecution, broken a window of a premises of the ruling party, United Russia. The accusation today relates to acts which would have been committed in detention: during a television viewing session, Azat Miftakhov allegedly engaged in “a deliberate justification of terrorist acts in front of two convicts”. 

“His mother was still hoping, but we, his friends, were expecting this scenario, testifies for Le Monde his wife, Elena Gorban, who came to wait for him in front of the prison. Investigators had warned him a week ago that he would be arrested. And they had prepared things beforehand. In recent weeks, Azat has been sent to solitary confinement for long periods. This has allowed investigators to pressure the inmates they need as witnesses.”

Miftakhov’s lawyer was only able to negotiate a five-minute meeting between the 30-year-old and his relatives – his wife, mother and stepfather. Supporters who came to welcome him were dismissed. “There was nothing happy and not much to say,” says Elena Gorban. We mostly spent this time hugging each other. Azat reassured his mother that he was holding on and would continue to hold on. The young man reappeared the next day, Tuesday, in a cage in the Kirov court, to be served with new charges and sent to pre-trial detention. 

This common practice in Russia – a release immediately followed by an arrest – had already been used at the start of the case.At the time, the police suspected Azat Miftakhov, then a brilliant doctoral student in mathematics at Moscow University, of manufacturing explosives. In the absence of any incriminating evidence, the investigators had been forced to release him after a week of interrogations (and torture, according to him). 

Azat Miftakhov was immediately arrested again, in the courtyard of the police station, this time on another charge: the mathematician allegedly broke the window of a United Russia office, before others threw a smoke bomb into the premises . During the trial, Miftakhov’s co-defendants cleared him, while admitting the facts. From then on, the accusation rested entirely on an anonymous witness who claimed to have recognized the accused, despite his mask, by “his expressive eyebrows”. Azat Miftakhov had been sentenced to six years in prison. 

During his detention, the mathematician was the subject of constant support abroad, coming both from left and extreme left groups and from the scientific community. He also continued his work, managing in particular to publish two articles. “He happened to scratch formulas with his fingernails on the walls of an isolation cell”, assures Ahmed Abbes, spokesperson for his French support committee and director of research at the CNRS. 

The case opened at the beginning of September again involves “secret” witnesses. According to the first elements presented, they heard Azat Miftakhov comment favorably, in front of the prison television, on the attack committed in 2018 against a premises of the FSB, the security services, in the city of Arkhangelsk. During his short interview with his mother, the young man denied having made such comments. 

Justice also claims that Miftakhov had informed fellow prisoners of his intention to leave Russia, or even to go and fight Russian forces in Ukraine to “avenge a friend”. It is not yet clear whether these charges will be used in a future trial or only serve to justify his remand. 

The relentlessness of the authorities against this young man with a fragile physique is obvious. For months, as his release approached, increasingly persistent rumors spoke of the opening of new cases, on separate grounds. “At one time, his notoriety protected him, notes Ahmed Abbes, but he also became a symbol. His refusal to cooperate or confess also made him an enemy of the security services.”

Anarchists and anti-fascist activists in general are treated with extreme harshness by the Russian regime. In the case of Miftakhov, this relentlessness readily takes a sadistic turn. During the month of May, as they sought to put pressure on the detainee to open new investigations, the security services circulated intimate photos of the mathematician in his prison, and revealed to his fellow prisoners his bisexuality. In the Russian prison world, such facts are supposed to lead to the ostracization of the prisoner and above all expose him to various forms of violence. 

These actions had been made public by his wife, Elena Gorban, at the request of Azat Miftakhov himself.

On September 4, 2023, Azat Miftakhov was arrested by the FSB agents immediately upon his release from the correctional colony in Omutninsk. An international day of solidarity to demand his release with rallies in many cities around the world took place two days before, with strong participation from the global mathematical community. Below are the speeches of Michel Broué on behalf of the Azat Miftakhov Committee and of Adrien Deloro on behalf of the Société Mathématique de France (SMF)

Speech by Michel Broué on behalf of the Azat Miftakhov Committee during the rally in Paris on the occasion of the International Day of Solidarity with Azat Miftakhov (September 2, 2023)

Four days ago, FSB agents went to the Omutninsk Penal Colony to question Azat Miftakhov about a new charge: “incitement to terrorism”. Azat refused to respond without his lawyer present.

The accusation is allegedly based on comments Azat made to other detainees while watching television last May.

But Azat must be released on parole the day after tomorrow. Should we fear an attempt to keep him in prison?
He has been in prison since February 2019, arrested, tortured, then convicted of hooliganism, accused of breaking a window. This accusation is based on highly suspect, grotesquely doctored testimonies.

Anatoly Vershik, a well-known Russian mathematician, said: “We mathematicians are meticulous people, we need proofs. But even the most skeptical among us are aware of the absurdity of the situation imposed on Azat Miftakhov.”

Mathematicians therefore mobilized to defend Azat.

International days have been organized twice (June 2021, July 2022), with the participation of leading mathematicians and many countries. Learned societies have spoken out across the world. Harvard University and Paris-Saclay University offered to host Azat and support him financially.

The Russian authorities should be careful. The math community is surprisingly strong and tenacious. It will survive regimes and their leaders, and no society can live today without mathematics.

We can cite individual cases of famous mathematicians intervening for freedom of speech and thought.

In the Dreyfus affair, the precise and meticulous testimony of the great Henri Poincaré played a leading role. During the First World War, the great German mathematician David Hilbert was insulted for having written in 1917 in praise of a French colleague: he obtained an apology.

And then, there are numerous examples of victorious collective mobilizations.

In 1950, the mobilization of mathematicians caused the American State Department to relent, after refusing a visa to the former Trotskyist Laurent Schwartz.

It was above all the mathematicians who, after sixty years of tenacious combat, obtained recognition of the responsibility of the French army in the assassination of one of their own, Maurice Audin.

It was an astonishing international mobilization that made Leonid Brezhnev himself give in by obtaining the release of the Ukrainian mathematician Leonid Pliouchtch in 1976. I remember Laurent Schwartz telling the KGbist at the USSR embassy that one day the name of Pliouchtch would be known around the world, and I remember the agent’s odious response, suggesting that Schwartz was (sic) as crazy as Pliouchtch. Who was right?

It was the mobilization of mathematicians that obtained from Turkey the return to France, in 2021, of our colleague Tuna Altinel, arrested there two years previously.

I repeat: let those who are attacking Azat Miftakhov be aware of this. Mathematicians around the world will continue to fight until they win. Because freedom of thought is the first ingredient of their life.

Freedom for Miftakhov

Speech by Adrien Deloro on behalf of the Société Mathématique de France (SMF) during the rally in Paris on the occasion of the International Day of Solidarity with Azat Miftakhov (September 2, 2023)

“Jail, a residence only mistakenly thought to be a place for meditation.”

These are words of the mathematician Évariste Galois, jailed by France’s Louis-Philippe. And yet: the young French republican was talking about the old Sainte-Pélagie jailhouse, and not about today’s Russian penal colonies with appalling conditions.

I shall not compare further Miftakhov and the great Galois; in particular since their mathematics are quite different.

Even acting out of sheer fright, a regime sentencing young talents for their opinions, is making a serious mistake.

Miftakhov works in probability theory, a domain shaped by Russian scientists of the XXth century. Carried by a childhood interest in mathematics, Miktakhov joins in 2009 the reputed Moscow State University, also called ‘Lomonossov University’. Just like every university, it is a place for critical spirit. And just like every university, it is monitored by the authorities.

No review of Miftakhov’s work can therefore spare one of the harassment against him.

As of today, viz. before defending his PhD, Miftakhov has already published four articles.

• The first one in 2016, during his first year as a PhD student, co-authored with his supervisor, in a journal which happens to be based in Ukraine. His scientific career starts brilliantly.
• A second paper follows in 2019, still co-authored, and published by the Russian Academy of Sciences. But 2019 is the turning point: arrested in February, Miftakhov quickly becomes one of the favourite targets of the authorities. He is tortured by the police; a few brave colleagues write a support letter, but Miftakhov has hardly been out of jail since.
• Despite these events, his third article is published by the prestigious Bulletin of the Polish Academy of Sciences; it had been submitted in late 2019, while Miftakhov was already behind bars. It was then call pre-trial custody’, and the beginning of a long journey through darkness.
• His fourth paper, written as a single author, shows his scientific coming-of-age. It is published by the University of Parma. Written in 2020, it appears in 2021. 2020 is the year of the official charges against him, and when the ‘trial’ starts; 2021, is when he is sentenced to a 6 year-term.

This fourth paper is the last to date: jail is no place for meditation. But Miftakhov has already been accepted by the mathematics community. Accepted and supported with a clear commitment, as shown by various actions asking for his release.

For the mathematics community is by definition international and non-partisan; its sole ideal is truth, but truth cannot come without justice.

Abroad, the case of Azat Miftakhov is followed by our colleagues in Brasil, Germany, Italy, Poland, Tunisia, the UK, the US…

In France, the two main mathematical societies are the SMF (French Math. Society) and the SMAI (Society for Applied and Industrial Mathematics).

The SMF has supported the mathematician’s Azat Miftakhov Committee since late 2020, while Miftakhov was still in custody, and relayed a first petition calling for his release. We have been following with concern what was called a trial, and regretted the sentence.

With the SMAI, we have written to the French Foreign Secretary Jean-Yves le Drian, asking that the French Embassy in Russia be represented at the appeal trial, in order to guarantee the rule of law.

Always with the SMAI, we have even, in February 2021, written to the President of the Russian Federation to express our concern.

And last month, appalled by the alarming news of detention conditions, we have written to the director of penal colony 17 where Miftakhov is still emprisoned.

All these were public letters, available on our website.

The SMF supports the mathematical community and its speech. It does not consider political opinions, but is rigorously committed to the defence of Human Rights as given by the international charter of Human Rights.

Azat Miftakhov must be released and allowed to return to mathematics.

Today, September 4, 2023, Azat Miftakhov was arrested by the FSB agents immediately upon his release from the correctional colony in Omutninsk. 

Azat Miftakhov arrested by the FSB agents on a new fabricated charge, immediately after being released from the prison colony on parole pic.twitter.com/lPnJnvykyJ

— Ahmed Abbes (@AA_AMDs) September 4, 2023

Azat has been in detention since February 2019, originally in the infamous “broken window” case related to a political protest at a United Russia party office. At that time of that arrest Azat was a mathematics graduate student at the Moscow State University.

Azat endured torture, threats, and other mistreatment by the Russian authorities while imprisoned. After a trial marked by widespread judicial abuses and the use of “secret witnesses”, in January 2021 in a grotesquely unjust and politically motivated verdict Azat was convicted of “hooliganism” and sentenced to five years in prison. Azat was widely recognized as a political prisoner and his bravery and perseverance inspired thousands of supporters, both in Russia and abroad. Azat was finally scheduled to be released on parole on September 4 from the prison colony in Omutninsk where he had been serving his sentence. All supporters of Azat, including the international mathematical community, have been looking forward to his release, and a massive solidarity action, The International Day for the Liberation of Azat Miftakhov, was held around the world on September 2.

Instead, Azat has been detained once again by the FSB, just as he exited the Omutninsk colony to meet his family, still in his prison robes. The FSB fabricated a new criminal charge against Azat, under Article 205.2, part I of the Russian Criminal Code, “publicly justifying terrorism.” The FSB claims that Azat spoke approvingly about a terrorist act in a conversation with two other prisoners in May of this year, after watching a TV program. It appears that this new false case against Azat was concocted in July-August while Azat was held in isolation after a series of artificially imposed punishments by the colony authorities. Azat was taken to Kirov, where a court hearing on his subsequent detention will take place tomorrow, September 5.

Azat Miftakhov is a brilliant young mathematician who came to embody the hopes of many for a free and democratic Russia. The new criminal case against him manufactured by the FSB is an outrageous travesty. These brutal Stalinist tactics must stop. Azat must be freed, immediately. The international mathematical community stands with him.

The Azat Miftakhov Committee

On August 29, FBS agents visited Azat Miftakhov in the Omutninsk prison colony and attempted to interrogate him in relation to the new “incitement to terrorism” charge. Azat refused to be interrogated without his lawyer present. According to Azat’s lawyer, Svetlana Sidorkina, this new criminal charge against Azat is based on some comment that he supposedly made to some other prisoners in the colony in May of this year while watching a TV program. It is not yet known what, according to the FSB, Azat is supposed to have said or what the TV program was about.

Azat is currently scheduled to be released on parole on September 4 after serving a blatantly unjust politically motivated sentence for “hooliganism” in the infamous “broken window” case. He has been behind bars since February 2019. The new “incitement to terrorism” charge against Azat is a brazen and outrageous fabrication by the FSB that appears to be aimed at preventing his release on September 4. 

Azat needs our support now more than ever. The manifest injustice the Russian authorities are perpetrating against a talented young mathematician cannot be allowed to stand. Azat must be freed.

Azat’s supporters are organizing an International Day for Liberation of Azat Miftakhov on Saturday, September 2. The international mathematical and scientific community, and all other people of good will aware of this case need to stand strong in support of Azat in this crucial moment.

The Azat Miftakhov Committee

PS. Updated list of rallies around the world in support of Azat Miftakhov on Saturday, September 2, 2023:

• Paris: Saturday, September 2 at 14:00 in front of the Russian Embassy in Paris, square Robert Schuman, 41 avenue du Maréchal Fayolle, 75016 Paris.
• Berlin: Saturday, September 2 at 12 p.m., Unter den Linden 63-65, in front of Russian Embassy (pay attention to the change of time and location)
• Vilnius: Saturday, September 2 at 2 p.m., Russian Embassy, Ukrainos Didvyrių g. 2.
• Erevan: Saturday, September 2 at 6 p.m. (Armenian time zone), Place de Russie, Miasnikiane monument.

According to a report by a Russian news site RTVI.com, the Russian authorities have opened a new criminal case against Azat Miftakhov, accusing him of “incitement to terrorism.” The new charge, under Article 205.2, part 1 of Russia’s criminal code carries the maximum penalty of a fine of 100,000 to 500,000 roubles or a prison term of two to five years. 

Azat is currently scheduled to be released on parole from the prison colony in Omutninsk on September 4, 2023. Despite an escalating series of punishments against Azat on various made-up pretexts in the last two months by the colony administration, it seemed possible that he may indeed be released on September 4, as scheduled, even if under significant restrictions.

However, this new charge appears to indicate that the Russian authorities intend to keep Azat imprisoned.

We condemn the new criminal charge against Azat Miftakhov and demand that he be freed. Like the original “hooliganism” charge of which Azat was convicted, the new “incitement to terrorism charge” is a political fabrication with no basis in reality. Azat Miftakhov is a talented young mathematician and he should be released so that he can resume his mathematical studies and research. His continued imprisonment and prosecution represent a manifest injustice and cannot be tolerated.

The Azat Miftakhov Committee

Currently Azat Miftakhov is scheduled to be released on parole on September 4, 2023. However, there remains a considerable danger that the FSB may proceed with a new fabricated charge against him in the so-called “Network” case.

Azat supporters are holding an international day of solidarity to demand his release on Saturday, September 2, 2023, with rallies in many cities around the world, including:

• Paris: Saturday, September 2 at 14:00 in front of the Russian Embassy in Paris, square Robert Schuman, 41 avenue du Maréchal Fayolle, 75016 Paris.
• Berlin: Saturday, September 2 at 12 p.m., Unter den Linden 63-65, in front of Russian Embassy (pay attention to the change of time and location)
• Vilnius: Saturday, September 2 at 2 p.m., Russian Embassy, Ukrainos Didvyrių g. 2.
• Erevan: Saturday, September 2 at 6 p.m. (Armenian time zone), Place de Russie, Miasnikiane monument.

Additional rallies and actions being organized in other cities. Please check the Mediapart blog Solidarité FreeAzat for updates. 

Those who cannot attend these rallies and wish to show their solidarity with Azat can take a photo with the FREE AZAT 04.09 poster in front of a university or any recognizable landmark in their city and email it to the FreeAzat campaign (libertepourazat@gmail.com). The photos will be published from September 3. Additional instructions are available here.

A petition of July 23, 2023, demanding Azat’s release (Liberté pour Azat Miftakhov !) is currently open for signing.

In solidarity,

The Azat Miftakhov Committee

To: Zykov A. N.
Director,
Correctional Colony 17, Omutninsk

Director Zykov:

Ahmed Abbes, mathematician, Director of research at CNRS, Paris

Alexandre Borovik, Professor  Emeritus (retired), University of Manchester, UK

Michel Broué, Professor emeritus of mathematics at the University Paris City

Fabien Durand, President of the French Mathematical Society, Professor of mathematics, Université de Picardie Jules Verne

Ivar Ekeland, FRSC, Professor emeritus of mathematics and former President, University of Paris-Dauphine

Michael Harris, Professor of mathematics, Columbia University

Ilya Kapovich, Professor of mathematics, Hunter College of CUNY, past Chair, Committee on the Human Rights of Mathematicians, American Mathematical Society

Raphaël Rouquier, Professor of mathematics, University of California, Los Angeles

Update of July 24, 2023

As reported by the FreeAzat! Telegram channel, during the July 19 hearing at the Omutninsk correctional colony that gave Azat a 7-day solitary confinement punishment, Azat was also officially declared to be a “malicious violator” of the prison rules. That means that when Azat completes his solitary confinement, he will not go back to the colony’s general population. Instead, he will be transferred to a “strict conditions” detention where he will serve the remainder of his sentence.  There Azat will no longer be able to make or receive phone calls and to receive parcels. The last remaining meetings with his family will also be cancelled.

We remain concerned that these escalating punitive measures against Azat indicate that the colony administration plans to ask the court to impose a particularly restrictive form of parole, called “administrative supervision”, if Azat gets released as scheduled on September 6. Another, also extremely concerning, possibility is that the FSB will attempt to exert extra pressure on Azat regarding the “Network” case, while he is effectively cut from outside contact in the next six weeks. 

We remain committed to fighting for Azat’s freedom and reaffirm our support for him in this difficult time.

The Azat Miftakhov Committee

Update July 19, 2023

The Azat Miftakhov Committee received an extremely alarming news that, in July, Azat has been put in solitary confinement twice: the first time on July 12, for three days and the second time on July 19, for seven days. 

The three day isolation term was ostensibly for some kind of violation of the rules regarding the contents of Azat’s bag, and the seven day isolation term was for lying down on the bed during the day while serving the three day isolation term. While in solitary confinement, Azat is required during the day to sit on a backless unsupported bench. Doing so exacerbates Azat’s back pain and headaches from which he has been suffering since even before the arrest. The colony administration forbade Azat from wearing a back brace, which alleviates these problems and which was recommended by a doctor. Azat is currently appealing this second, seven day, solitary confinement.

Azat is currently scheduled to be paroled from the Omutninsk prison colony on September 6, 2023, a little over a month from now. It appears that this recent escalation of punitive measures directed at Azat by the colony administration indicates their intention to impose a severely restricted form of parole (called “administrative supervision”) in case Azat does get released.

We are greatly concerned by these developments and call on the Russian authorities to respect Azat’s rights, to ensure that he receives all the necessary medical treatment while at the colony and to release him as soon as possible.

The Azat Miftakhov Committee

This op-ed was published in French by the Azat Miftakhov Committee in the newspaper Le Monde on June 20, 2023.

When the Moscow State University mathematics PhD student and anarchist activist Azat Miftakhov was arrested in February 2019, Russia was not yet the pariah country it has become since its invasion of Ukraine. On the contrary, the city of Saint Petersburg had just been chosen to host the International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) in July 2022. In spite of this, the FSB, the Russian intelligence service heir to the KGB, failed to exercise the slightest restraint in its brutal arrest of Azat, which was filmed and broadcast on the public television station Russia-24. Torture, a sham trial on false charges of “hooliganism” and a disproportionate sentence of six years in prison followed. The latest abuse, the homophobic criminal exploitation of Azat’s bisexuality, was revealed recently by his wife.

Azat was charged with “manufacturing explosives” when he was arrested in February 2019.  He was tortured at the police station, but after three days the court dismissed the case for lack of evidence. He was released and then arrested again before he left the police station. This time he was accused of participating in a plot more than a year earlier to break a window in one of the offices of President Putin’s United Russia party. Azat pleaded not guilty. But on January 18, 2021, a Moscow court handed down a six-year sentence in a penal colony, based on the testimony of two secret witnesses – one of whom claimed to have identified him while he was allegedly masked, by his “expressive eyebrows” and died several months before the trial.

The Russian human rights organization Memorial had already recognized Azat as a political prisoner in 2019. Human Rights Watch declared the verdict unjust and abusive, and called on authorities to overturn it.

Azat is currently serving his sentence in penal colony 17 in Omutninsk in Kirov province. He is assigned to hard physical labor in a carpentry workshop. He was slated to be released on September 23, 2023. However, according to several reports, the FSB is fabricating a new criminal case against him, and is considering charging him with being a member of the anti-government group known as “Network”. The FSB obtained forced false testimony against Azat from Igor Shishkin, a prisoner it was interrogating in the penal colony in Valdai. Igor was exfiltrated from Russia and took refuge in France. He told Mediapart how he ended up agreeing under torture to compromise Azat by loading his file with imaginary crimes. If he is found guilty on these new bogus charges, Azat faces a much longer additional prison sentence.

Shortly after his arrest in 2019, state television Russia-24 aired a second report on Azat showing private and intimate photographs of him seized during the search of his apartment in Moscow. Elena Gorban, Azat’s wife, recently announced that around the same time, the FSB exposed Azat’s bisexuality to his fellow inmates by unveiling similar (presumably the same) photographs to them, so that he would be marked as a member of the so-called “offended” caste, the lowest status in the Russian prison caste hierarchy. This status remained attached to Azat after his transfer to the Omutninsk penal colony.

The offended, also known as the downgraded and the shamed, are the lowest of the low, and are often isolated from the general prison population. It is strictly forbidden for other detainees to touch them, to touch their belongings, or to borrow food or cigarettes from them, on pain of being downgraded themselves. All the dirty work – like cleaning toilets – is usually left to members of this caste. Given the extreme level of homophobia in Russian society, LGBT inmates are particularly vulnerable in the Russian prison system and are automatically cast into this lowest caste. According to experts, about 40% of the downcasts are forced to have sex. A similar social caste has existed in the Russian military since Soviet times.

The international mathematical community mobilized to defend Azat as soon as he was arrested. Numerous professional associations, including the national mathematical societies of France, the United States, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Italy and Spain, have issued public statements expressing concern about his case. The Doctoral School of Mathematics of Paris-Saclay University named Azat an honorary student and invited him to complete his doctorate in Paris as soon as he is released. The Scholars at Risk section of Harvard University awarded Azat a fellowship to continue his research at Harvard.

The ICM, initially scheduled for Saint Petersburg in July 2022, was an important mobilization lever. After its transformation into a virtual congress following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we continued the mobilization for the liberation of Azat by integrating it in the more general mobilization against the atrocities committed by the Russian authorities against the Ukrainian people, and against the repression of all free voices in Russia who dare to express their opposition to the war. We draw our inspiration and our faith in the cumulative effect of our actions in the history of the commitment of the mathematical community to the defense of fundamental rights and against injustice: in particular that of the Audin committee and the committee of mathematicians for the defense of several persecuted mathematicians in the world, for instance the Ukrainian Leonid Pliouchtch during the Soviet era.

The Azat Miftakhov Committee