Evgeny Konovalov Chairman of the Russian Social Democratic Union of Youth (RSDUY) and member of the Executive Committee of the Union of Social Democrats (lead by M. Gorbachev) was dismissed from Russian state company for his political and public activity. Three weeks before that (June 3) Evgeny was hired on a position of a head of department of advertising and marketing in a state company “Russian Post”, which is directly subordinated to the Ministry of Communications. During this short period Evgeny managed to find and suggest several ways to increase the company’s profit. Some of those suggestions were already in the process of implementation. Nonetheless on June 23rd the companies headquarters found out he was an oppositional political activist and on June 24th he was fired. No attempt was made to even hide the actual reason of dismissal in front of Evgeny’s colleagues (there is an audio recording proving it), however he was forced under threats to sign a cancellation of an employment contract on basis of “mutual approval of parties”. Members of the RSDUY are extremely indignant by such pressure from the authorities. Organisation believes that Russian state is effectively issuing a ban on profession for oppositionists. Russia is now completely declining to totalitarianism when government controls all spheres of life, persecuting oppositionists not only on political level but interfering into their private lives. The official reaction of Mikhail Gorbachev followed immediately; he is shocked and outraged by this situation: “What kind of democracy can we talk about in such state of affairs? We can expect that hundreds of people who have and share their views different from views of authorities can be subject to persecution”. Mikhail Gorbachev as a shareholder of an independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta asked its’ editorial stuff to carry out an investigation of dismissal of Evgeny Konovalov. RSDUY asks for solidarity support from the socialist organisations and assistance in spreading this information as well as in putting pressure on Russian government to stop persecution of oppositional politics. International support is much needed and important for us. In hope in your solidarity, Alexey Karpov International secretary of RSDUY +79119517681 E-mail: smarty_al@mail.ru