We know how consistently the authorities and pro-government activists try to desecrate and destroy symbols of memory and respect for people’s democratic heroes — it’s enough to recall what happened at the site of Boris Nemtsov’s murder. Now it looks like they’ve moved on to those who cannot be “cancelled” in any other way: the memory of people murdered for the right to speak the truth. And this must be said plainly: repression today is not only directed at the living. It is carried out against the murdered as well — against memory, names, and public signs of respect.
What follows is simply a timeline of absurdity.
For the seventh time, activists have installed a memorial plaque on the building where Anna Politkovskaya lived. The previous one was torn down again — a new plaque was put in its place. Volunteers hung a photo of Anna next to it and laid flowers.
Politkovskaya was a Novaya Gazeta journalist and a human rights defender. She wrote about war and crimes, torture and abductions, about Chechnya — about what the country’s authorities preferred not to see.
On October 7, 2006, she was shot dead in the elevator of her own building. A memorial plaque was later placed on the facade — and on January 18, 2026, it was smashed (https://t.me/zapravarf/4155?single). After public outrage, a court found Aleksandr Filippov guilty (https://t.me/zapravarf/4169) and punished him “seriously”: a 1,000-ruble fine under the petty hooliganism article.
And then the real part began: not an investigation, not protection of memory, not preventing vandalism — but an assembly line of destruction.
From January 19 to 23, people installed four more plaques — and each one was destroyed (https://t.me/zapravarf/4175). On January 24, activists placed the fifth plaque higher and hung it on a string, because glue and tape had proven “insufficiently vandal-resistant” (https://t.me/zapravarf/4181). It was removed as well. On January 25, the plaque was restored for the sixth time (https://t.me/rusnews/79498). A “Last Address” (Posledniy adres) plaque also appeared on the building. And next to it activists added another sign — a blunt diagnosis of what is happening:
“Here they repress the memorial plaque of Anna Politkovskaya… Freedom for political prisoners!”
This is not a dispute over a plaque and not a “neighborhood conflict.” It is a show of power: you are not even allowed to remember. But as long as the plaques keep returning — memory is not erased.