The Russian-American journalist Masha Gessen has been granted a visa to speak at a festival in Australia, after initially facing delays due to criminal charges laid in absentia.
Gessen, an outspoken critic of Vladimir Putin, was initially due to arrive in Australia last weekend to speak at events at the Wheeler Centre and the Festival of Dangerous Ideas.
But their visa had been delayed after the Department of Home Affairs demanded police checks from Russia, documents that would have been impossible to source.
The department then reportedly demanded police and FBI checks in the United States, a jurisdiction Gessen has never been charged or convicted in.
Gessen said on Monday the delays had meant they were “functionally declined” entry to Australia, aiding in Russian attempts to silence them.
But speaking to ABC Radio on Tuesday, Gessen said they had received their visa but were unsure when they would arrive in Australia.
“I actually just heard, minutes before I got online, that the visa has finally been granted,” they said.
Gessen said they had been “surprised” to hear Australia had delayed the visa, adding that the purpose of the charges and convictions in Russia was to constrain their movement and “intimidate” them.
“I indicated on my application, honestly, that I had been convicted by a Russian court.
“While my [visa] application was pending, I was tried in absentia and sentenced to eight years in prison.
“I was sentenced for reporting on Russian war crimes in Ukraine. I am one of about 250 people who have faced charges under these laws, passed as soon as Russia staged a full-scale invasion of the Ukraine.
“Like several of them, I am abroad, so not actually in prison, and they can’t actually do anything to me except try to constrain my movement and intimidate me, which is their whole purpose here.
“I was thinking that would be a problem for countries that have extradition treaties with Russia, or that are Russian allies, and I have had to take them off my travel schedule, but I did not think it would happen in Australia.”
The Department of Home Affairs was contacted and said it did not comment on individual cases.
The Festival of Dangerous Ideas is presented by The Ethics Centre whose executive director, Simon Longstaff, said: “A sensible rule, designed to screen people who have committed genuinely criminal acts, was at risk of being misapplied in this case.”
“Home affairs has acted on an important principle: that Masha’s conviction by the Russian state is unjust,” Longstaff said on Tuesday.
“Masha Gessen has only ever acted according to values and principles that Australians generally profess. The approval of Masha’s visa demonstrates Australia’s principled opposition to the kind of political oppression at work in Vladimir Putin’s Russia.”
