On February 3 Petrozavodsk city court held the first meeting on the suit of dismissed teacher Gleb Yarovoy to Petrozavodsk State University (PetrSU). According to representative of the university, lawyer Vasily Tomashchuk, a request, on the basis of which Yarovoy was fired, came from the Federal Security Service (FSB) of Russia.
Tomashchuk said that Petrozavodsk State University received this request at the end of October 2016. It contained a list of university staff, who traveled abroad in 2016, Yarovoy was among them. After that administration of the university found that during two trips abroad – Georgia and Finland – the teacher was not on vacation and did not drew up a business trip. University lawyer was unable to answer questions about the content of the request. Besides, it appeared that the request was not duly registered in the office of the university, because, according to Tomashchuk, it was transferred to one of the leaders of the university in person. It also remained unknown if the university wrote a response to the request.
Judge Pavel Malygin decided to request it of the FSB. However, missaid that he was "99% sure that the answer was negative, that no request was sent". In addition, the court agreed with the prosecutor's office representative that the next hearing it was necessary to testify the first vice-rector of PetrSU Sergey Korzhov, who initiated the dismissal of Yarovoy.
Studying the materials of the case revealed that one of the trips was inscribed in the individual plan of Yarovoy's work in the 2016/17 academic year and has been agreed with his supervisor – head of the department. The judge was surprised by this fact, saying that if this was true, then it could be a violation of worker rights by the university administration, as it prevented the fulfillment of his individual plan.
The next court hearing is scheduled for 16 February.
Associate Professor of the Institute of History, Political and Social Sciences of PetrSU Yarovoy contests his dismissal in court. According to him, he was fired on November 18 after the university received a request, and refused to give it to Yarovoy. Administration required to write an explanatory note about two foreign trips instead.
The teacher asked the court to find out why the university administration did not make a reprimand or has used some other form of disciplinary punishment, and immediately signed an order of dismissal – despite 14 years of work without disciplinary action and appeal of colleagues in his defense. In the lawsuit, he demanded to change qualification of the offense, to reduce severity of the penalty and to reinstate him at work.
The teacher suggested that the dismissal was the result of his public work. In spring of 2016 he led regional office of the movement to protect the rights of voters "Voice" on a voluntary basis, after which he was informally warned that it became a problem to continue working at the university. Yarovoy is also the author of a number of materials on human rights violations in the Republic of Karelia, published on «7x7».
Sergei Markelov, «7x7»
