Former Soviet submarine officer and nuclear-safety inspector Aleksandr Nikitin began working with Norway’s Bellona Foundation in 1994 on a report about hazardous conditions surrounding Russia’s Northern Fleet nuclear submarines. The FSB arrested him in February 1996 and charged him with treason through espionage, alleging that his contributions disclosed classified information. After ten months in pre-trial detention in Saint Petersburg, he was released in December 1996 on the order of Deputy Prosecutor General Mikhail Katushev. Amnesty International declared him a prisoner of conscience on 30 August 1996, while the case drew international criticism over the prosecution of environmental disclosure.
The Saint Petersburg City Court rejected the prosecution’s evidence in October 1998 but returned the case to the FSB for further investigation; Russia’s Supreme Court upheld that decision in February 1999, and prosecutors filed new charges in July. A second trial ended in Nikitin’s full acquittal on 29 December 1999. The Supreme Court confirmed the acquittal, which became legally final on 17 April 2000, and the court’s Presidium rejected a further reopening request on 13 September 2000. Nikitin’s case became a landmark victory for environmental and nuclear-safety whistleblowing in post-Soviet Russia; he later led Bellona’s Saint Petersburg branch and received the 1997 Goldman Environmental Prize.
