Kovalev, Sergeĭ Aleksandrovich

In 1969 Kovalev was working as a senior fellow in biology at his alma mater, Moscow University, when he was released due to his political activities. Already known as a dissident, he joined Andrei Sakharov and others in 1969 in founding the Initiative Group for the Defense of Human Rights in the USSR. Despite his dismissal, Kovalev managed to continue his scientific career, working at an experimental fish hatchery on problems in chemical mutagenesis, and he persevered as an activist. In 1974, however, the Soviet authorities once again intervened and his scientific career ended. In 1973, Kovalev and two colleagues, Tatiana Velikanova and Tatiana Khodorovich, resumed publication of The Chronicle of Current Events, a samizdat news letter that became the primary uncensored source for information about the dissident movement. Produced secretly using typewriters and carbon paper (since the Soviet authorities restricted use of photocopiers), the Chronicle defended the gamut of repressed and dissident groups, and was correspondingly perceived as a significant threat to the government. One year later, Kovalev also became a founding member of the USSR branch of Amnesty International, while his increasing visibility as a supporter of other dissidents added further fuel to the fire.

On December 23, 1974, the KGB raided Kovalev's apartment in Moscow, confiscated his files on prisoners of conscience, and sent him to a prison in Vilius, Lithuania, to await trial. Charged formally with anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda carried on for subverting or weakening the Soviet regime, Kovalev faced a laundry list of specific allegations: association with The Chronicle of the Lithuanian Catholic Church, the longest running dissident journal in the Soviet Union, being a member of the Initiative Group, signing appeals on the first anniversary of the invasion of Czechoslovakia, supporting other dissidents and political prisoners, sending information on the Soviet gulag abroad, and resuming publication of The Chronicle of Current Events . Sakharov responded by denouncing the charges as little more than a pretext to clamp down on dissidents of all sorts.

Kovalev pleaded not guilty, and in an "open" trial filled with irregularities, he was sentenced to seven years in a labor camp and three years of exile. Fresh off his Nobel Prize, Sakharov led protests against the conviction in Russia, while colleagues, concerned scientists, and other human rights activists outside of Russia began a campaign to petition Soviet authorities for his release. Although these efforts kept Kovalev's case in the public eye, they did little to shorten Kovalev's term, and after his release in 1984, he was barred, as the court had directed, from living in Moscow, making a living at menial jobs.

Kovalev was finally allowed to return to Moscow in 1987 and resumed his activities on behalf of human rights. After the fall of the Soviet Union, he entered politics, winning election to parliament beginning in 1990. Even in office, he remained consistent in his stance on human rights, protesting against human rights violations in Chechnya, arguing that "the most influential forces in Russia today are attempting to establish an authoritarian regime."

From the guide to the Sergei Kovalev Collection, 1974-1990, (American Philosophical Society)