The human rights project Gulagu.net, which focused on helping prisoners, announced on July 20 that it was ending its work. The decision was published on the initiative’s Telegram channel, where the team said it faced mounting pressure, discrimination, and growing risks for those involved.
The statement said the group was being harassed, that its accounts were being blocked, and that it was facing insults and pressure. The project added that under the new circumstances it was forced to suspend its activities.
Gulagu.net was founded by former businessman Vladimir Osechkin. He left Russia in 2015 and now lives in France. In 2022, Osechkin said there had been an attempt on his life in Biarritz, France.
In 2025, a Russian court sentenced Osechkin in absentia to eight years in prison in a case over so-called fake information about the army. The source material also says that several people in Russia received real prison terms for cooperating with Gulagu.net.
The report also mentions a dispute involving the project’s founder. The outlet Proekt accused Osechkin of taking credit for others’ work and misleading informants. The activist responded by saying that people had “thrown mud at him from behind his back.”
The announcement that the project was closing marked the culmination of sustained pressure on the initiative and its participants, pressure that the Gulagu.net team described publicly in its statement.