Some academic researchers in Russia are trying to prevent their colleagues from being elected to the Russian Academy of Sciences because of their support for the invasion of Ukraine.
If they succeed, they will deny those who back the war a prized qualification that confers prestige in Russian institutions of higher learning. Their campaign could show that some acts of protest are still possible despite the government's actions.
The Russian Academy of Sciences is a network of research institutions in various disciplines. It has nearly 1,900 members in Russia and 450 nonvoting foreign members.
New members are elected every three years. There are 304 seats for senior academicians and 217 for corresponding members in the upcoming poll. More than 1,700 candidates have applied.
A group of Russian researchers started circulating a list of candidates who have publicly supported Russia's invasion of Ukraine by signing pro-war declarations or letters their universities or institutions released.
Hundreds of high-ranking officials at Russian universities signed a letter in support of the war in March.
Many researchers have taken a stance against the war. More than 8,000 Russian scientists and science journalists have signed an open letter against the invasion.
Three academic researchers who were not identified because they risk job loss, imprisonment and their safety by publicly opposing the war said in interviews that they helped create a list of those who supported the war to prevent them from being elected to the academy.
The leadership of the Russian Academy of Sciences did not respond to the request for comment.
Some voters think the list could make a difference.
Alexander Nozik, a physicist at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology who was not involved in creating the list, said most of the scientific community is antiwar.
The Russian Academy is not as powerful as it used to be.
A historian who specializes in Russian science said that it used to be a vast network of research institutes containing the best scientists in the country.
The academy has been implicated in ethical problems in the past. Russian academic journals and research publications were found to be rife with plagiarism, self-plagiarism and gift authorship, where scientists were listed as co-authors of manuscripts without contributing to the work. Russian journals withdrew more than 800 research papers because they were thought to have committed ethical violations.
A commission at the academy found that several university officials were guilty of publishing papers in questionable journals, listing fake collaborators and plagiarism.
Some say that the academy's upcoming election is less important because of these problems.
A lot of people in Russian science still believe that the academy is the oldest structure that can do something, not because it is good, but because others are worse.
In the city of Kharkiv. Several neighborhoods in the northeastern city, where the Ukrainians repelled an attempted Russian encirclement in May, came under fire again. At least nine people were killed in the attack, which shattered the sense of relative peace that had begun returning there.
There are talks in Europe. European Union leaders will meet on May 30 and 31 to discuss the effects of the war on the global economy. Hopes that the summit would end the standoff between Hungary and Russia seem to have faded.
The Russian Academy of Sciences has been involved in disputes over the invasion of Ukraine before. It released a statement about the war on March 7. Critics believed that it was not antiwar as it should have been, but that it was the closest any official institution in the country could come to condemning Russia's aggression.
The repercussions of the war and how the international response to it would affect Russian science were addressed in the statement.
The academy said in its statement that it condemns any attempts to exert political pressure on researchers, teachers, graduate students and students.
Some researchers fled Russia because of the war. Russian and Ukrainian academics have been given positions in universities and institutions around the world. Some people who relocated to the Free University of Berlin were aware of Anna Abalkina, a sociologist of Russian origin.
Many scientists who remain in Russia are barred from participating in certain projects, working with international partners and attending certain conferences due to the deepened isolation of scientists who remain in Russia.
The decision of influential international databases to stop offering their services in Russia is one of the factors.
She said that the quality of publications will go down immediately.
The future of Russian science depends on whether President Putin stays in power.
He believes that it is not possible to do modern science in Russia under Putin's regime.
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