On 22 March 2007, police officers arrived at the office of the Nizhny Novgorod Foundation to Support Tolerance in Nizhny Novgorod, Russia with the suspected intent of detaining two of its leaders, Stanislav Dmitrievsky and Oksana Chelysheva.
The two human rights defenders managed to obstruct the police officer’s plans by immediately contacting international human rights organizations and western diplomats in Moscow officers. The attack on the office is the latest in a series of police actions against the leaders of human rights organizations over recent days. Both Stanislav Dmitrievsky and Oksana Chelysheva have been subjected to heavy police surveillance, and uninvited visitors have presented themselves at their residences.
On January 23, the Federal Supreme Court of Russia denied an appeal of a lower court's order to close the Russian-Chechen Friendship Society (RCFS). The RCFS, based in Nizhny Novgorod, was one of the few remaining organizations in Russia that was reporting on human rights conditions in Chechnya and the North Caucasus. 
