Svodoba Alliance NSW president Ilya Fomin at the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine this year. He is seen trying to set fire to his Russian passport.Credit:Steven Siewert
Svoboda Alliance emerged in Australia and New Zealand to protest the February 2021 jailing of Russian anti-corruption campaigner Alexei Navalny. Their protests in capital cities took on new life when Russia invaded Ukraine in February this year. Svoboda is Russian for “freedom”.
The alliance holds meetings,maintains Facebook groups and runs letter-writing campaigns directed at Australian and Russian leaders to challenge the Kremlin’s extensive propaganda operations aimed at Russians in the country and abroad. It has chapters in NSW,Victoria and South Australia.
“We had a very clear understanding that something like that could happen,” said Galina Seredina,secretary of Svoboda Alliance NSW Inc. “This is a kind of new reality for us.”
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“We don’t know if it’s a risk for Svoboda Alliance or for us individuals,” Seredina said. “We don’t want to do any harm to anyone outside of the organisation.”
The alliance has published alengthy video questioning the activities of the Russian embassy in Australia,calledThree Hectares of ZVO in the Land of Kangaroo which discusses the group’s concerns about propaganda found on the embassy’s websites,among other issues.
Vasily Piskarev,head of the State Duma commission to investigate the facts of foreign interference,is quoted in InterFax as saying:“It is proposed to recognise their activities as undesirable,and some as extremist”.
In addition to challenging the Kremlin’s rationale and narratives for the invasion of Ukraine,the alliance has been fundraising for Ukraine’s humanitarian effort since the war began.