ALEKSEYEV, MIKHAIL VLADIMIROVICH (Rus. АЛЕКСЕЕВ Михаил Владимирович, b. November 1, 1958, in Dzhezkazgan, Kazakh SSR).
Worker, the last political prisoner of the special regime.
Completed secondary education. Served in the army. Worked as a supply manager at a research institute in Yalta. He listened to foreign radio stations, admired the Western way of life, and sought to go abroad.
In 1981, he was arrested for purchasing 20 Deutsche Marks. On December 17, he was sentenced by the judicial collegium for criminal cases of the Yalta city court under Article 80, Part 1 of the Criminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR (“Violation of regulations on currency transactions”) and Article 154, Part 1 of the Criminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR (“Speculation”) to 3 years of imprisonment in a general-regime colony. In the zone, he worked as a medical orderly. He wrote poems and kept notes, which were later deemed “anti-Soviet.” He was released in 1984 after serving his term.
He worked as an electrician at a textile factory in Korostyshiv, Zhytomyr Oblast. He attempted to create an underground youth organization. On November 12, 1985, he was arrested on charges of illegal production, possession, and sale of narcotics and on February 18, 1986, was sentenced by the judicial collegium for criminal cases of the Zhytomyr regional court under Article 229-1, Part 2 of the Criminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR to 7 years of imprisonment in a strict-regime colony. Sentenced along with him to the same term was 20-year-old Yevhen Kropantsev. Alekseyev served his sentence in colony YaYu-309/179 (Zhytomyr).
On November 24, 1986, investigators from the investigative department of the UKGB under the Council of Ministers of the Ukrainian SSR for the Zhytomyr Oblast confiscated from Alekseyev notebooks and letters with records of an “anti-Soviet, slanderous nature” (about 40 pages). That same day, he was arrested and sentenced by the judicial collegium for criminal cases of the Zhytomyr regional court in an on-site session right in the zone under Article 62, Part 1 of the Criminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR (taking into account Articles 2, 26, 42, 43) and Article 70, Part 1 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR to 10 years of imprisonment (with 1 year and 12 days already served credited) with confiscation of property (case No. 56). He was declared an especially dangerous recidivist. Witnesses at the trial were common criminals who testified that Alekseyev had “called for the overthrow of Soviet power.” His term was set to end on November 12, 1995.
On February 23, 1987, Alekseyev arrived by transport at the special-regime section of colony VS-389/36-1 (Kuchino settlement, Chusovskoy Raion, Perm Oblast, Russia). Finding himself in an environment he had long sought, Alekseyev quickly adopted an uncompromising position and joined the struggle for the rights of political prisoners. For example, on June 17, 1987, Alekseyev, I. SOKULSKY, M. HORBAL, P. RUBAN, and M. HORYN refused to go to work and declared a hunger strike in solidarity with prisoners L. LUKIANENKO, M. NIKLUS, and H. PRYKHODKO, who were in the SHIZO (punishment isolator) and had been punished by Captain Gatin for refusing to work on strengthening the fence (the “zapretka” or forbidden zone).
On November 7, 1987, along with I. KANDYBA, I. SOKULSKY, P. RUBAN, and H. PRYKHODKO, he adopted Political Prisoner Status (demands: return to their homeland to serve their sentences, abolition of forced labor, head shaving, and wearing of chest badges, the opportunity to work in their profession, regular visits, and freedom of correspondence, and a review of their cases). They also demanded that criminal cases be initiated against the head of the Skalninsky district UKGB of the Perm Oblast, Colonel Afanasov; KGB Majors Balabanov, Vasilenkov, Zakharov, and Lukashov; camp warden Major Dolmatov; warden of VS-389/35, Osin; MVS Major Maksin; warden of VS-389/37, Colonel Khorkov, and others.
Due to the closure of the special-regime section in Kuchino, on December 8, 1987, he was among 18 prisoners transported to institution VS-389/35 (Vsekhsvyatskaya station, Tsentralny settlement), where he continued to be held in a cell. During his imprisonment, he spent about 80 days in punishment cells.
On February 30, 1988, by a decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on pardoning prisoners, Alekseyev's term was reduced by 1/3. By a decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR dated November 30, 1988, Alekseyev was released on December 2—the last of the special-regime political prisoners. A writ of execution for 900 rubles remained against him.
For some time, he lived with his mother in Leninogorsk, East Kazakhstan Oblast, and from 1989, in Moscow. He worked as the secretary of the Moscow Helsinki Group.
Bibliography:
Interview with Mikhail Alekseyev // “Ukrainskyi chas” (Dnipropetrovsk – Lviv), 1989, No. 1. – February.
Ovsiienko, Vasyl. “Idy, i ne hrishy bilshe…” [“Go, and sin no more…”] // Vechirnii Kyiv, 1994. – August 26.
Archive of the Memorial Museum of the History of Political Repressions and Totalitarianism in the USSR, Perm, Russia.
International Biographical Dictionary of Dissidents in Central and Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union. Vol. 1. Ukraine. Part 1. – Kharkiv: Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group; “Prava liudyny.” – 2006. – pp. 1–516; Part 2. – pp. 517–1020; Part 3. – 2011. – pp. 1021-1380; Alekseyev, M., pp. 1031-1032: https://museum.khpg.org/1295951940
Rukh oporu v Ukraini: 1960 – 1990. Entsyklopedychnyi dovidnyk [Resistance Movement in Ukraine: 1960 – 1990. An Encyclopedic Guide] / Foreword by Osyp Zinkevych, Oles Obertas. – Kyiv: Smoloskyp, 2012. – 2nd ed. – 896 p. + 64 ill.; Alekseyev: p. 50.
Vakhtang Kipiani. Supplemented on December 20, 2010, by Vasyl Ovsiienko, Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group. Last read May 13, 2016.
In the photo: former political prisoners at the office of the Ukrainian Republican Party: Mykhailo Horyn, Mykola Horbal, Vasyl Ovsiienko, Mikhail Alekseyev, Mykhailo Kukobaka, Levko Lukianenko. 1991, Kyiv.