By Ekaterina Janashia | 2026-01-13

In the legal annals of post-Soviet Russia, 1997 was supposed to mark a turning point -- the year a modern Criminal Code was established to distance the new federation from the shadows of the KGB era.

But by the close of 2025, that distance has been replaced by a judicial machinery that processes "enemies of the state"” at a rate unseen in the country's modern history.

According to a landmark study by analyst Kirill Parubets, conducted for the human rights project Department One, Russian courts convicted 468 people of treason and espionage in 2025 alone.

It is a grim new record that shows a fundamental transformation of the Russian legal system into a wartime instrument of political purging.

Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the number of individuals caught in this dragnet has surged past 1,000.

As of December 10, 2025, the report identified at least 1,627 people who have been named as defendants in cases involving "treason" or "espionage."

Who is a traitor?

The most striking revelation in Parubets' report is the shifting profile of the "traitor."

Traditionally, espionage cases targeted intelligence officers, high-ranking diplomats or military officials with access to classified blueprints. In 2025, that archetype has been replaced by the ordinary citizen.

The largest group of defendants now consists of Russian citizens with no prior history of political activism. They are IT specialists, university students, teachers, factory workers and entrepreneurs.

For many, their "treason" did not involve passing secret documents, but rather small digital footprints -- a $10 donation to a foreign charity, a text message to a relative in Ukraine or an expressed "intent" to flee the country.

"These charges are almost always brought against people who had no access to state secrets," the Department One study notes.

Instead, the Federal Security Service increasingly relies on provocateurs -- undercover agents who solicit anti-war sentiments or small financial contributions in online forums, only to arrest the respondent moments later.

The geography of repression

The crackdown is no longer confined to Moscow or Saint Petersburg.

The report highlights that prosecutions are now occurring across Russia's entire territory, from the Baltic coast to the Pacific, and deep into the Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine.

In these occupied zones, the second-largest group of defendants emerges: Ukrainian citizens. Of the 1,627 total defendants identified since the war began, 564 are Ukrainians.

Many of these individuals are residents of the Donbas, Zaporizhzhia or Kherson regions who have been accused of "espionage" for simply observing military movements in their own hometowns or refusing to cooperate with occupation authorities.

A system without exit

For those caught in the web of Article 275 (Treason) or Article 276 (Espionage), the chance of a legal defense is a hollow formality. In 2025, there was not a single acquittal in these cases.

The judicial process has retreated almost entirely into the shadows.

Because these cases involve "national security," they are nearly always heard behind closed doors. Defense attorneys are often forced to sign non-disclosure agreements that prevent them from speaking to the media or even the defendant’s family.

This secrecy serves a dual purpose: it prevents the public from seeing the often flimsy evidence used by the prosecution, and it creates a vacuum of information that makes it impossible for human rights groups to track the well-being of the accused.

Parubets' report notes that for hundreds of defendants, basic information, including their current location or the specific nature of their charges, remains unknown.

Rising sentences and death

The severity of the punishment is also escalating. Between 2024 and 2025, the median sentence handed down for treason jumped from 12 to 15 years.

The 2025 statistics paint a dark picture of the outcomes.

Four defendants were sentenced to life imprisonment.

Six defendants were subjected to compulsory psychiatric treatment, a move critics say mirrors the "punitive psychiatry" used against Soviet dissidents to delegitimize their opposition.

Three individuals died in custody before their cases could reach a conclusion, highlighting the brutal conditions of pretrial detention for those accused of state crimes.

The report stresses that the Kremlin's search for internal enemies knows no age limits.

The youngest defendant, Valentin Tsyganok, was just 17 years old at the time of his arrest, a student whose life has been diverted into the penal system before it truly began.

On the other end of the spectrum is Valery Zvegintsev, an 80-year-old scientist.

His case has sent a shudder through the Russian academic community, signaling that decades of scientific contribution offer no protection against charges of "sharing secrets," even when the data in question has been previously cleared for publication.

The trajectory of these prosecutions suggests that the Russian state has moved beyond temporary wartime measures.

By categorizing "undermining the constitutional order" as a crime that can be committed by anyone with a smartphone or a bank account, the authorities have created a permanent state of legal insecurity.

For the 420 defendants still under investigation and the 179 whose cases are currently sitting on judges' desks, the precedent set in 2025 is a grim omen.

In a system where 78% of all "constitutional" crimes are now funneled through the treason article, the line between a private citizen and a state enemy has effectively been erased.