Help weaken Putin's regime and end the war

In 2025, the Anti-Corruption Foundation continued to do what it was created to do: investigate corruption, name those in power responsible for crimes, and expose how Putin’s system really works.

1.Throughout the year, we published investigations into top officials, security services, and propagandists — tracking money flows, luxury real estate, and corruption schemes that continue to operate even during the war.

2.The most important investigation of the year for us was our investigation into the murder of Alexei Navalny. We were able to reconstruct, almost minute by minute, what happened to him in the penal colony. We continue to collect evidence, establish the full chain of responsibility, and demand that those responsible be named and held accountable.

3.At the Yulia Navalnaya Forum together with experts, journalists, and civil society leaders, we continued a crucial conversation about what Russia after Putin should look like. This discussion matters now — so that when an opportunity for change comes, society is ready.

4. We continued to support political prisoners through the Solidarity Marathon. Millions of rubles raised during and after the livestream are helping political prisoners and their families survive under repression.

5. This year, the first Alexei Navalny Prize was awarded. It went to the creators of the Zaodno platform, which enables people to support those persecuted by Putin’s regime.

6. We also launched a large-scale campaign against United Russia — the ruling party that for years has served as the political backbone of repression, war, and systemic corruption. This campaign will continue next year.

7. Our work has real consequences. Individuals exposed in our investigations have been sanctioned in different countries, and our campaigns have drawn international attention to the danger of normalizing support for Putin’s regime. In particular, we pushed for the cancellation of concerts by pro-Putin propagandists Valery Gergiev and Ildar Abdrazakov. This is not a quick process, but the mechanism works — and we see it working again and again.

8. We continue telling the truth in the darkest of times. In 2025, millions of people kept on watching and reading ACF — on YouTube and other platforms — despite censorship, pressure, and blocking.

All of this is possible only because of your support — from those who read, share, argue, explain to others, and help us continue our work.

September was an intense and productive month for the Anti-Corruption Foundation. Despite relentless repression and censorship, our team continues to investigate corruption, expose Putin’s regime, and reach millions of people inside and outside Russia. 

Here’s what we’ve accomplished this month:

launched a major campaign against Putin’s ruling party, United Russia
released three new investigations
strengthened international pressure on Putin and his allies
conducted a nationwide survey showing Russians’ growing fatigue with the war
helped Russians avoid forced military service and win cases at the European Court of Human Rights

Campaign against Putin’s United Russia

Next year, Russia will hold parliamentary “elections.” Of course, they won’t be real—Putin’s regime controls every aspect of the process. But election periods are one of the few times when millions of people inside Russia start thinking about politics again.

That’s why we’ve launched a campaign to expose United Russia—the party of war, corruption, and poverty. Our goal is to show that no one genuinely supports it and that Putin’s so-called “national unity” is a myth.

Local initiatives across Russia—from Udmurtia to Voronezh—have already joined the campaign. Together we will show that there is no real support for Putin or his party.

Investigating the murder of Alexei Navalny

In September, Yulia Navalnaya released new details about the final days of her husband, Alexei Navalny, who was poisoned and killed in a Russian prison in February 2024.

We have testimony from prison staff and confirmation from two independent European laboratories: Alexei was poisoned. Yulia is demanding that the labs publish their findings—the world deserves to know the full truth.

Exposing corruption and propaganda

Igor Krasnov—Putin’s loyal prosecutor turned Supreme Court chairman

Krasnov was responsible for political repression, the destruction of independent media, and the prosecution of Alexei Navalny’s lawyers. Our new investigation reveals that his family acquired luxury real estate worth 1.5 billion—including an $8 million apartment near the Kremlin registered in the name of his two-year-old son.

Vladimir Medinsky and Anatoly Torkunov—rewriting history for Putin

Vladimir Medinsky, best known internationally as the Kremlin’s chief negotiator during peace talks with Ukraine, has long been one of Putin’s key propagandists. Together with Anatoly Torkunov, the rector of the elite MGIMO university that trains Russian diplomats, he wrote a new state-approved high-school history textbook now mandatory for all 11th graders in Russia.

The textbook glorifies Putin, justifies the invasion of Ukraine, and spreads conspiracy theories about the West. At the same time, both Medinsky and Torkunov have personally profited from the system they helped sustain.

What Russians really think about the war

Our sociological team conducted a nationwide poll, showing a clear trend: Russians are tired of the war and want peace.
Only 8% support additional military spending—the lowest level in three years.
75% want immediate peace talks.
31% believe healthcare should be the top government priority.
41% say the authorities are failing in their duties.
75% oppose criminal prosecution for opinions or speech.
Even under propaganda and repression, the demand for peace and normal life is growing.

International work
Europe. When media reports suggested that the EU might ban tourist visas for Russians, ACF sent an official appeal to Brussels. We urged the EU to target oligarchs and regime officials—not ordinary Russians. As a result, the latest sanctions package was adopted without a visa ban.

Australia. Yulia Navalnaya met with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Foreign Minister Penny Wong. Australia introduced new sanctions against Putin’s cronies on the same day—many of them featured in our investigations.

Canada. Together with Vladimir Kara-Murza and Ilya Yashin, Yulia Navalnaya appealed to the Canadian government to accept Russian asylum seekers facing deportation from the United States—to save them from imprisonment or torture back home.

Legal work
Since 2017, ACF’s legal team has filed over 1,100 applications to the European Court of Human Rights on behalf of Russians unlawfully detained or persecuted by the regime. We have won 979 cases and secured almost €4 million in compensation for victims of political repression.

In September alone, our lawyers won six cases related to the 2021 pro-Navalny protests, totaling €24,500 in damages awarded to the victims.

Thank you for standing with us
Each investigation, each court case, each campaign

Links:

• Together against Putin's party
• Whan was Navalny poisoned with
• The secret life of the prosecutor general