On April 10, the Israeli mathematical community published a statement in support of Russian mathematician Mikhail Volkov, who is being pursued by the FSB, accusing him of financing extremism. The search and initiation of criminal proceedings against the 70-year-old scientist became known on April 3. Now he is under a non-deportation order. Leonid Volkov, the mathematician’s son – an oppositionist and a key associate of Alexei Navalny – said that his father was fired “one day” from the Ural Federal University back in February after 48 years of work at the university. According to T-invariant’s source, the dismissal was initiated by the secret service in advance so that when a criminal case was initiated, “it would not so clearly cast a shadow over the region’s leading university.”
The Israeli mathematicians said in a statement that they were “has suddenly lost his job and has been placed under a travel ban.”
“Professor Volkov is an outstanding mathematician, a world leader in algebra, whose groundbreaking achievements are highly recognized across the mathematical world. His classical results include seminal contributions to semigroup theory, associative algebras, and theoretical computer science. He is known all over the world as a man with hundreds of followers who has brought great honor to Russian mathematics. He is the managing editor of a leading international research journal, Semigroup Forum, published by Springer.” reported the statement.
Mikhail Volkov is a student of Lev Shevrin, a major specialist in semigroup theory. Until recently, Volkov was a professor, head of the Department of Algebra and Discrete Mathematics at UrFU, chief researcher, and deputy head of the laboratory of combinatorial algebra. For many years he has been active in teaching and published until recent months with a high citation rate. In its social networks, UrFU repeatedly spoke proudly about the work of the scientist. After his dismissal, many pages with information about Volkov were removed from the university’s website.
A letter from the Israeli mathematical community, which has existed since 1953, reports that many of the country’s scientists have worked closely with Volkov for more than forty years, exchanging academic visits, joint papers and projects.
“Those of us who know Professor Volkov have never heard him speak about politics in any form. Rather, he is known as a man totally dedicated to mathematical research and to educating thousands of Russian students who have contributed to Russian society.” note the authors of the statement.
The Israeli mathematical community believes that the crackdown on Volkov has united scientists from a wide range of political views and therefore managed to release a statement promptly.
“The views of scientists on these or those events are very different, in particular within the Israeli mathematical community. But in the case of Prof. Volkov, we have a unified opinion about our colleague, an outstanding scientist of international renown, with whom Israel has longstanding scientific ties. In particular, some of the Israeli mathematicians are participating in a conference in Portugal entirely dedicated to his 70th birthday. His standing in the scientific world is impeccable in terms of education, decency and humanism. Mikhail Volkov’s whole life is an example of selfless service to science and education without any far-fetched connections to political events. All mathematicians are shocked that instead of advancing cooperation and scientific ties for the benefit of the entire scientific community, we have to write in defense of our colleague in order to provide him with immediate and advanced treatment in Israeli clinics, as there are serious restrictions on his movements, as far as we know,” a union representative told T-invariant.
Israeli mathematicians are asking the FSB to take into account Mikhail Volkov’s health problems, as described by his son in his video.
“We express our deep concern for his health, and we ask for him and his family to have a way to come to Israel before his health deteriorates. Israel is a world-recognized center for advanced technologies that provide full treatment in such cases. We believe that, despite the existing travel ban, such a humane decision is appropriate considering the international standing, age, and health condition of Professor Volkov. He will be a most welcome addition to our mathematical community.” — Israeli mathematicians end their letter with this statement.
Earlier, T-invariant published a material in which colleagues of Mikhail Volkov recorded a new milestone in the repression: the second major scientist is planned to be sentenced for donating to FBK for a term incompatible with life, without regard to merit and advanced age. Recall that another doctor of physics and mathematics, Sergei Abramov from Pereslavl-Zalessky, a major supercomputer specialist and corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, is about to be sentenced (T-invariant has been following this case in detail). As in Volkov’s case, the most powerful letter of support came not from Russian scientific organizations, but from foreign ones: for the first time in a long time, the American Physical Society issued a public appeal.
Volkov’s case marks another turning point: the return to the practice of prosecuting relatives of political opponents of the Kremlin, oppositionists or activists. In fact, the Russian security service is returning both punitive psychiatry and the status of ChSIR – family members of a traitor to the homeland – to its arsenal of pressure tools.