Yana Kuzmina, a recent student and now an assistant prosecutor of the Sovetsky district of Novosibirsk, lawyer of the third class, has requested for Oleg Kabov, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences , seven years of general regime colony, a fine in the amount of his salary for three years, restriction on departure from his place of residence and a three-year ban on scientific activities at the Institute of Thermophysics of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which – “taking into account the characteristic of the scientist’s personality” – will contribute to the correction of the defendant. This criminal case initiated by the FSB is a challenge to the entire scientific community of Russia. For the first time in the history of the country, a scientist is being tried for the scientific result itself, in the assessment of which the experts disagreed. And for the first time, the prosecution is demanding that Kabov be banned from doing science. So far, Kabov has been helped neither by the leadership of the Russian Academy of Sciences, nor by an open letter from the American Physical Society, nor by a public campaign and a strong lawyer. Kabov’s sentence will show whether science in Russia can defend its right to exist.
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Corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, head of the laboratory Oleg Kabov is being tried under article 159 (part 4) of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (fraud committed by an organised group or on a particularly large scale) for the fact that he performed scientific research under the Federal Target Programme by 37.76%, received money from the Ministry of Science, distributed it to his employees in the form of bonuses, and then forced his subordinates to give this money to the laboratory fund. The victim in the case is the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation. The criminal case was initiated by the FSB of Novosibirsk and is based on the expertise conducted by the Republican Research Scientific and Consulting Centre for Expertise (RINCSE).
This is the first criminal case in modern Russia when a scientist is criminally charged for not conducting research well enough (T-invariant detailed all the circumstances of Kabov’s case in this article).
According to the prosecution’s version, Kabov committed embezzlement using budgetary funds of the Ministry of Education and Science in the payment of allowances in the amount of 7 million 218 thousand rubles when carrying out scientific work within the framework of the FTP. Guilt, according to the assistant prosecutor, is confirmed by the totality of evidence and testimony of the victims. “In fact, all the reporting documentation is a compilation of previously obtained scientific achievements and fundamentally new knowledge and achievements are not obtained”, – concludes the assistant prosecutor Yana Kuzmina. Based on the testimony of witness Orlikova Kuzmina states that “the work of the laboratory was not focused on obtaining new knowledge, the main goal was to create a positive reputation of the laboratory in order to obtain as many new grants, subsidies and co-financing as possible”.
“We were shocked to hear the prosecutor’s office’s demand,” Kabov’s wife Elena Bykovskaya told T-invariant. – During the investigation and the trial we had already chewed everything up, showed everything to the investigators, the prosecutor’s office and the judge. The prosecution did not take into account any of the arguments of the defence. We offered to show a working installation. The judge did not allow it to be used in the course of proving Oleg Alexandrovich’s innocence. This is some kind of order, an attack against Russian science”.
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“The accusation against Kabov is a spit in the face of all Russian science,” says Bulat Nigmatulin, a doctor of technical sciences. – The ban on doing science – this was not even in Stalin’s times. The scientist was placed in a sharashka, but he was not deprived of science. Representatives of the prosecutor’s office were unable to sort out an obvious case, rejecting all the arguments of the defence, and in view of the consequences for the whole of our science showed their complete unprofessionalism, in fact committed an official crime. And all this happened because our scientific community showed its complete impotence and inability to defend itself. Neither someone from management of the Siberian branch of RAS, nor the president of branch Valentin Parmon has not invited to session of presidium of SB RAS the head of prosecutor’s office on Novosibirsk region or the head of Novosibirsk FSB to receive explanations for colleagues. And if they refused to come, they should have turned to Moscow – to the Prosecutor General’s Office and to FSB Director Bortnikov. But none of this was done, no one even tried to mobilise Siberian scientists to defend their colleague. So, the same fate now awaits every member of the Academy”.
“I am shocked by the cruelty of the indictment, which did not take into account evidence from the defence,” says Natalia Berlova, a professor at Cambridge University and a member of the American Physical Society’s Committee on International Freedom of Scientists (CIFS).
From the text read out by the prosecution, it remains unclear what Kabov is accused of. That the work was not done properly? That he embezzled money from employees? Or that the laboratory was created in order to “master” the state money, and Kabov was not interested in science? If the former, why did the Ministry of Science successfully accepted the reports of Kabov’s laboratory and paid the money? If the second, why is the issue of extortion of personal money from his subordinates handled by the FSB? And if the third, why do the investigative bodies and prosecutor’s office decide on the expediency of scientific activity of this or that laboratory?
Isn’t creating such a high-tech laboratory and at the same time imitating scientific activity a very sophisticated way of siphoning money from the state? Especially cynical is the demand for a ban on scientific activity in order to correct the defendant. In the opinion of the prosecutor’s office, the best way to set a scientist on the right path is to ban him from doing science?”
Earlier, the American Physical Society sent lettersto Gennady Krasnikov, President of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Valery Falkov, Minister of Science and Higher Education, and Dmitriy Marirov, Director of the Kutateladze Institute of Thermophysics. Kutateladze Institute of Thermophysics Dmitry Markovich in support of Oleg Kabov. There were no responses. According to some members of the academy, in personal conversations with them RAS president Gennadiy Krasnikov repeatedly said that he was doing his best to help his colleagues under investigation.
According to a lawyer working in Novosibirsk and following Kabov’s trial (the interlocutor wished to remain anonymous), such an accusation is a mental attack. It is used in cases where no offence is known to exist. Ask for an incredibly harsh sentence and then agree to a suspended sentence, which will be seen as a victory for the defence. In the absence of acquittals in modern jurisprudence, finding a person guilty with a suspended sentence has come to look like a fair decision. According to the lawyer, it is not by chance that the prosecutor’s office entrusted an assistant prosecutor, a recent student,to announce the charge : “The charge contains so many obvious contradictions that apparently no one from the ‘adults’ wanted to be framed.”
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Text: T-invariant Editorial Board
Editors 22.01.2025