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Russian laws requiring many activists, media organizations and individuals to register as “foreign agents” are arbitrary and violate human rights, Europe’s top human rights court has ruled in a published ruling Tuesday.

“The legislation was stigmatizing, misleading and used in an overly broad and unpredictable manner,” said the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).

The judges found that Russia had violated the plaintiffs’ rights to freedom of expression and association – Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights – as well as the right to privacy guaranteed by the Article 8.

“The purpose of the Russian laws was to punish and intimidate rather than to address a supposed need for transparency or legitimate concerns about national security,” the court added.

The case was brought by 107 plaintiffs, including NGOs and media, who viewed the laws as part of a systematic campaign against rights defenders and government critics.

Among them are the human rights organization Memorial, which documented Soviet crimes, and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

“Journalists, human rights defenders, environmental activists, political scientists” and others joined the action, the court said.

Political NGOs receiving foreign funding have been required to disclose their status as “foreign agents” since 2012, under laws that the ECHR ruled in 2022 violated the European Convention on Human Rights.

Media organizations, individual journalists and others followed later, with a 2022 law establishing a broad, catch-all definition.

The sanctions include massive fines, with RFE/RL ordered to pay the equivalent of approximately 16 million euros ($17.3 million).

So-called foreign agents are also barred from holding public office, receiving support from the Russian state, teaching in public institutions, and producing content aimed at minors.

In the most extreme cases, Memorial, the Human Rights Movement, and the League of Voters Foundation were all disbanded for alleged “gross and repetitive” violations of foreign agent labeling requirements.

For individuals and groups, “the designation…as ‘foreign agent’ has significantly hampered their activities, triggering additional accounting, auditing, reporting and labeling requirements and limiting their participation in the electoral process and/or the organization of public events,” the judges noted. .

The court noted that opinion polls showed that most Russians “associated the term ‘foreign agent’ with ‘traitors,’ ‘spies,’ or ‘enemies of the people.’

Concerning respect for private and family life, the plaintiffs’ personal data were published and they had to file “frequent and detailed” reports on their finances, which, according to the court, was “to overburden and intimidate them” .

The restrictions, particularly on the exercise of certain professions and the interruption of communications with young people, “cannot be justified as being necessary in a democratic society”, added the judges.

The court ordered Russia to pay the plaintiffs sums ranging from 5,000 to 10,000 euros for non-financial damage and “various other sums” for concrete financial damage.

The ECHR is one of the 46 members of the Council of Europe, the continent’s highest rights body, and is separate from the European Union.

Russia was excluded from the Council of Europe in March 2022 after its invasion of Ukraine, but the Court’s judgments remain binding on it in cases dealing with events before that date.

The Russian parliament adopted amendments preventing Moscow from applying ECHR decisions rendered since its exclusion.