Andrei Yurevich Blinushov was for many years director and editor-in-chief of the internet portal Human Rights in Russia. Since 1989 he has been chair of Ryazan Memorial, and since 1998 has been a member of the board of the International Memorial Society. After military service, Andrei worked as a police officer until 1989, when he resigned in protest at the use of force by Ryazan OMON to break up a voters’ rally in the city on 5 April 1989, and at the persecution of civic activists. After working as an inspector for the Russian Society for the Preservation of Historical and Cultural Monuments in Ryazan, in 1990-91 he was Ryazan correspondent for Radio Liberty and subsequently worked as a journalist for Ryazansky Vestnik, Vechernyaya Ryazan, the historical and human rights journal Charter, and the Polish, Russian-language journal Bulletin of Centres of Pluralism. In 1995-1996 he was an expert of the Presidential Human Rights Commission, and a member of the so-called ‘Kovalev Group’ in Chechnya and Ingushetia. In 1996 Andrei became director of Human Rights Network. Andrei is the author of a number of publications on human rights in Russia, and recipient of several awards.