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The Insider's investigative journalist and Dissernet co-founder Andrey Zayakin. Photo: Yakutia.Info
The Zamoskvoretsky District Court in Moscow has sentenced Andrei Zayakin, an investigative journalist with The Insider and the co-founder of the anti-plagiarism watchdog Dissernet, to five years in prison in absentia on charges of “financing extremism,” according to reports by independent news outlet Mediazona and business publication RBC, citing Zayakin’s attorney.
The verdict stems from donations Zayakin allegedly made to the late Alexei Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation (ACF), an organization that the Russian authorities labeled as “extremist” in June 2001. Zayakin, through his lawyer Mikhail Biryukov, denied all charges.
“I do not consider myself guilty. I want to express my gratitude to my family for their love and understanding, to my lawyer [Biryukov] for his professionalism, and to my friends and colleagues for their support,” Zayakin said in a statement relayed to the court by his attorney.
The case was initially opened in 2022, when Zayakin was briefly detained in Russia before being released under travel restrictions. He later left the country and was placed on a nationwide wanted list, later being added to a terrorist watchlist by Russia’s Federal Financial Monitoring Service. During interrogations in 2022, Zayakin exercised his right to remain silent.
According to Mediazona, investigators also questioned several people who had received money transfers from Zayakin, including his wife — who was reportedly asked to explain even small transactions, such as 1,000 rubles (less than $13) sent for a birthday cake.
Zayakin’s case is one of many in a growing list of prosecutions against Russian citizens accused of donating to the Anti-Corruption Foundation.
Dissernet, founded in the early 2010s by scientists and civic activists, focuses on uncovering plagiarism in academic dissertations and research papers purportedly written by public officials. The group has exposed numerous cases of improper citation and academic fraud among high-ranking figures.
Andrey Zayakin’s work for The Insider has exposed Russia’s ongoing evasion of international sanctions amid the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Malfeasance uncovered by Zayakin includes schemes involving the re-export of Russian gold, operations of the “shadow fleet,” and Russia’s illegal procurement of microchips, steelmaking equipment, silicon, capacitors and other resources essential to keeping Moscow’s military-industrial complex running.
A full list of Andrey Zayakin’s publications can be accessed via the following link.
Other journalists at The Insider persecuted for their work include fellow investigative reporter Sergei Ezhov, investigative journalist Anastasia Mikhaylova, and editor-in-chief Roman Dobrokhotov, who was the subject of a foiled kidnapping and murder plot orchestrated by the FSB.