Grigory Yavlinsky’s address to the deputies of the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, 26.12.2012

The Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg did not put into the agenda the address to the Federation Council calling the latter to reject the so-called Dima Yakovlev law (the «orphans law»). The address was initiated by ten members of the Legislative Assembly, including the YABLOKO faction. An appeal from Grigory Yavlinsky, leader of the YABLOKO faction, was distributed among deputies before the plenary session. Here comes the complete text of the appeal.

Dear citizens of Petersburg, dear deputies,

The bill prohibiting adoption of Russian orphans by U.S. citizens is in the final stage of consideration [by the parliament]. It has to pass only the Federation Council and signing by the President.

A number of public and government officials: Sergey Lavrov, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dmitry Livanov, Minister of Education, Anton Siluanov, Russian Finance Minister, Vadim Tulpanov, member of the Federation Council of Russia, and many other spoke against the bill. 100,000 signatures of people demanding from the Russian authorities to abandon such a “cannibalistic” bill were collected within a week.

Why so many people are outraged?

Why even the most devoted members of the Cabinet dared to speak against the law?

Because the law is not simply political blackmailing, it is immense government’s and human meanness against defenseless orphans.

The adopted law envisages that thousands of little abandoned and often sick Russian children will be deprived of the opportunity to live like a human beings simply because some officials (who, by the way, because of their theft make these kids destitute) had been offended or «insulted» by the wording of the American [Magnitsky] law.

The provocative nature of such a decision is obvious. Exactly six months ago the SAME MPs also voted almost unanimously for the agreement with the United States on the adoption of children. By this time, Dima Yakovlev had been dead for four years already, and it suited them all.

And now protecting their foreign accounts, 420 deputies and their hosts staged a “hooligans’ brawl” with U.S. Congressmen on «what have you said? and who are you to tell me such things?»

Protecting their overseas shopping [“rights”] the corrupt officials assure us that the Magnitsky law is against Russia. It is not true.

First, the U.S. Act can be classified as “a moralizing guidance”, this is a declaration, it does not bring anything new into practices.

Second, those responsible for the deaths of people in Russian prisons are not Russia, they are criminals (as, for example, a sadist maniac Chikatilo was not Russia) and an indication from abroad that there are such people in Russia is not a and can not be an insult to Russia.

But sanctions against Russian orphans, imposed by the State Duma, which is a disgusting, cruel, unfair and cowardly decision taken unanimously in a pseudo-patriotic frenzy, a «shopping revenge for the reproach», inflicting the maximum possible damage to its own citizens, in this case to the desolate and defenseless children whom the bureaucratic state considers its property, as serfs, as inanimate objects, are certainly a criminal and anti-Russian action.

Even according to [Russia’s Ombudsman] Pavel Astakhov, 19 Russian children adopted by American parents were killed in the US for the past ten years. However, only since the collapse of the USSR Americans adopted about 100,000 Russian children. For comparison, according to the RIA Novosti data, as of 2006, 1220 children adopted by Russian citizens were killed in Russia in the 15 years from the collapse of the USSR. According to the data from the official website of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, dozens of cases of murder of children (including infants) by their own parents have been documented in Russia only for 2012. In St. Petersburg, in 2011 alone, 113 children were adopted by U.S. citizens, and 215 by citizens of the Russian Federation.

Those who will keep silent today thus will vote for the sanctions not against Americans, but against the most defenseless of Russian citizens. And it will lie at their doors forever.

Dear Citizens! The adoption of this law is a question of ethics, when all the speculations and arguments, fears and doubts have to pale into insignificance because to accept it means ceasing being a human.

I think that after all the protests the bill will be signed in a non-working form and adoptions will continue, but I think it our duty to call you to show normal human emotions, stop being afraid, openly demonstrate your categorical rejection of political meanness and demand from the President and the upper house of the parliament to abolish the idea of involving children into disgraceful bargaining.

Grigory Yavlinsky,

YABLOKO